


As close as it gets to home

by AirgiodSLV



Series: As close as it gets to home [1]
Category: Bandom
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-08-24
Updated: 2007-08-24
Packaged: 2017-10-19 02:16:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/195749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AirgiodSLV/pseuds/AirgiodSLV
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Ryan takes in a breath, retreating from Spencer’s mind to brush against the newcomer, but when he reaches there’s nothing there.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	As close as it gets to home

**Author's Note:**

> Telepath police consultant AU. Title taken from the BTE song ‘Our Finest Year.’ Thanks to , who has claimed this story as her own and provided more support and encouragement than I have ever deserved; to and for reading and sharing their thoughts; and to for the amazing beta.

“Walker’s here.”

Gerard looks up and sees Frank’s head poking around the corner of the door to his office. He waves him in; not like Frank ever waits for his invitation anyway, but they’re been trying to tread more carefully around each other recently, if only to avoid the upheaval that tends to follow.

“What’s he like?” Gerard values Frank’s opinion on most things. He doesn’t technically work for their department; he’s the supervisor and coordinator for the majority of the smaller specialty teams like theirs, which in a way makes him Gerard’s boss. But Gerard heads up the second-best Telepath Response Unit in the country, and he has a higher official rank, which in a way also makes him Frank’s boss.

They try never to get to the point of pulling rank. It’s better for everyone that way.

“Friendly, scruffy, looks kind of like a hobo,” Frank reports, leaning against the door and crossing his arms, clearly thinking it over. “I always expect the shrinks to be more…unapproachable. He’s got a nice smile.”

“Should I be worried?” Gerard says, with more of a genuine twinge than he really wants to admit to himself. If Frank wants to seduce their new psychiatrist, there’s not anything major standing in his way. This isn’t his department, and it’s Gerard’s own fault that he’s out of the picture now as far as Frank’s love life is concerned.

Frank, bless him, forbears to point that out. “He’s kind of short,” he says instead, wrinkling his nose and grinning.

Gerard laughs, leaning back in his chair. “Look who’s talking.”

“Yeah, yeah. I’m going back down to help him set his shit up, are you coming?” Frank looks relaxed, eyes sparkling, head cocked to the side. Gerard lets himself look for exactly three seconds before he waves him out.

“I’ll be down in a minute. Try not to tell him too many horror stories, will you?”

Frank’s grin is bright and nothing like innocence. “Gee, you know I only speak the truth.”

It’s sort of true. But there’s enough truth floating around their department to scare off many a psychiatrist, professional or not. “Shoo,” Gerard orders, and Frank scoots.

  


* * *

  
The new shrink’s coming in today. Ryan drops his shit on his desk and wonders if they’re having some sort of office greeting-party, or if they all have to set up special first-session appointments, but he doesn’t see the new guy and only sees Gerard for a moment. He drifts by on the stairs overlooking their work area, raising a hand in greeting and disappearing again. It’s very Gerard. Ryan shrugs to himself and starts reading his office web-mail.

He feels Spencer come in before he sees him, the low-level buzz in the back of his mind that means Spencer is near. He and Spencer grew up together, trained together, got assigned together, and haven’t been apart for more than a week or two since they were kids. The presence of Spencer in his mind is almost something he takes for granted, and Ryan opens his own mind in response, passing a wordless greeting that he feels returned automatically just as Spencer appears and slides in at the desk across from him.

Spencer logs in and then reaches over to the computer next to them, on the desk shoved up tight sideways between the two of them, and logs Brendon in. Ryan raises an eyebrow, and Spencer shrugs, but Ryan gets enough from the images flitting across his mind to understand that Brendon made a pit-stop to get them coffee.

He’s always buying them coffee. Ryan thinks it might be the primary reason Spencer keeps him around.

“New guy?” Spencer inquires while Ryan flicks through the daily load of office e-mails, stuff about policies and PR and whose turn it is to clean the kitchen and the new signature they’re all supposed to put on the bottom of their outgoing e-mails. Ryan never does.

“Haven’t seen him.” Ryan knows how Spencer feels about shrinks, and privately he shares the opinion. Their last one hadn’t been bad at all, but she and Spencer had definitely not gotten on well, so Ryan sees anyone as an improvement.

There’s the soft sound of a throat clearing, and Ryan jerks back and slams his elbow into the back of chair hard enough to make his eyes water. No one, _no one,_ sneaks up on him like that. He can sense anyone within a hundred feet or more, and his mind’s already cracked, open to the flow of thoughts and impressions from Spencer.

“Hi,” the guy standing at Brendon’s unorthodoxly-positioned desk greets them. He’s got bangs falling in his eyes and a scarf around his neck, and he has one hand outstretched to Ryan clad in fingerless gloves. “I’m Jon.”

Ryan takes in a breath, retreating from Spencer’s mind to brush against the newcomer, but when he reaches there’s nothing there. It’s not shielding, he can feel that, can still sense the smooth telepathic barriers designed to keep him out. This is like soft static, like the television on low at two a.m., and Ryan stares in horrified fascination. They’ve sent a…

“Neg,” Spencer finishes his thought, and Jon grins, dropping his hand easily without a sign of offense that Ryan hadn’t taken it.

“The latest psychiatric craze,” Jon agrees, turning to Spencer instead. He doesn’t extend his hand this time, which is probably a good thing because Spencer probably wouldn’t have taken it either. “Is there someone else working here? I saw three files, but I know you guys usually work in pairs…”

“Oh hey,” Brendon says, appearing like he’s heard his cue to come onstage, juggling a cardboard carrying tray with three enormous cups along with his keys and ID card. He somehow fumbles the whole mess into one hand, and Ryan sees Spencer rise halfway out of his chair, sensing disaster.

Brendon just grins. “Cool scarf,” he says cheerfully. “You must be Jon.”

  


* * *

  
Brendon’s been with them since August. Spencer doesn’t know what exactly happened with his last partner, just that he’d been pretty screwed up over a suicide call that had started out with Brendon trying to talk a guy down off the ledge and ended with Brendon still in the guy’s head when it hit the pavement.

He’d bounced back in a miraculously short time, which Spencer privately feels has a lot to do with Ryan, and then attached himself to the two of them. For whatever reason, Gerard has yet to find him a partner, so the three of them share calls and divvy up the workload based on personal strengths. Brendon’s desk has been jammed next to theirs for months now, and no one’s ever tried to move it.

Brendon is also the most open, so Spencer isn’t surprised that he’s the one doing most of the chatting with Jon on their way out to the deli-café down the street. Jon had invited them all out, as a treat for his first day. It seems like a get-to-know-you but feels like it could be a session, so Spencer is staying quiet and reserving judgment, and the low hum coming from Ryan confirms that he’s doing the same.

Brendon’s on a vegetarian kick, after too many looks into the soft brown eyes of farm animals with placid, uncomprehending minds, so he orders a portabella burger and silently dares Jon to say anything. Jon wisely doesn’t.

The mushroom comes with a whole wheat bun and brown rice instead of fries, and Brendon looks so crestfallen when his plate is set in front of him that Spencer almost laughs. Jon just pushes his plate between them, a mountain of French fries ripe for the taking, and Spencer is fairly certain that Jon has just won a friend for life.

He sends this thought to Brendon and gets an affectionate ‘fuck off’ shove in return, but Brendon is grinning when he does it. Ryan is still staring at Jon, and Spencer can feel him, a little, pushing and poking. It’s weird for all of them, the empty place where Jon both is and isn’t; a presence with no thoughts floating on the surface, constant white noise.

Jon smiles, stolid in the face of Ryan’s unnerving stare. He’s got a nice smile and warm eyes, something compelling that makes you want to open up to him. Spencer isn’t convinced.

“I know it’s weird for you guys,” Jon says easily, reclaiming one of his fries to dip into the puddle of ketchup. “My friend Bill is a telepath, it drives him absolutely batshit sometimes. He even tries to read my mind through the phone.”

“Why are they hiring Negs as shrinks when you can’t feel anything that’s going on with us?” Ryan asks bluntly. They’ve all been thinking it, but Spencer hadn’t been about to come out and say it. He feels Brendon look up from his burger, curious.

“The theory is that zeroes can’t tell when they’re being manipulated, and telepaths empathize too strongly to be objective,” Jon answers, and if he’s upset by the questioning he doesn’t show it. “They did a study in Chicago, and it turns out Negs have an easier time dealing with telepaths under high levels of stress because they aren’t directly exposed to their emotions.”

Jon sounds like he’s reading from a pamphlet, and Spencer thinks _high levels of stress, that’s us,_ but doesn’t comment. He feels Ryan’s mind brush his and links without conscious thought, listening to the suspicious, unsure buzz of Ryan’s thoughts and returning them with his own.

Brendon joins their silent communion less than a second later, sliding in and around their link with an ease Spencer has never felt with anyone else besides Ryan. Brendon’s thoughts are more positive and more emphatic, tiny multicoloured starbursts of optimism and goodwill. Spencer can feel Ryan wearing down in the face of Brendon’s positive energy, giving ground.

“Wow,” Jon says, jerking them all out of their meld. “It’s really kind of creepy when you do that.”

Ryan’s head jerks up. “You can hear us?” he asks, and the suspicion is back, the edge to his voice. Spencer knows what he’s thinking even without a link; if Jon can hear them but they can’t hear him, Ryan won’t have any part of this.

“No.” Jon shakes his head, but there’s still a faint, wondering smile on his lips. “I can just see the way you look when you’re focused on each other.” He takes a sip of his cola and shrugs apologetically. “I haven’t seen three people do it before, usually just partners. Somehow it’s less creepy.”

“Welcome to the creepfest,” Brendon announces, waggling a french fry in Jon’s direction. Jon laughs, and it’s such an honest sound that Spencer blinks. They’re not linked anymore, but Ryan gives him a look that says _maybe,_ and Spencer’s eyebrow responds, _we’ll see._

  


* * *

  
“Are you ever going to find a partner for Urie?” Frank asks, and Gerard nearly jumps out of his shoes.

“Jesus Christ,” he complains, heart still racing in protest at the start. “Can you knock?”

“You’re supposed to be telepathic,” Frank points out, grinning like the evil bastard he is. “Can’t you feel me coming or something?”

“I was concentrating,” Gerard mumbles, cheeks warm, but the truth is he’s exhausted. His awareness starts slipping when he doesn’t grab enough meals and hours of actual sleep.

“You’re tired.” Frank is too perceptive, always. He pulls out the chair on the other side of Gerard’s desk and takes a seat. If this were six months ago, he’d be standing behind Gerard’s desk, working the knots out of his shoulders and laying a kiss at the nape of his neck.

It isn’t, though, so Gerard stops thinking about it.

“Big case,” he responds, which is answer enough between the two of them. “It’s about to get kicked over to us; they think a telepath will be able to infiltrate and gain enough information to take the syndicate down.”

“The syndicate,” Frank echoes, and then, “You’re not talking about _Toro._ ”

Gerard nods, and rubs the heels of his hands over his eyes until the resulting white spots start to hurt more than the original headache.

“Jesus Christ,” Frank says again. “They want one of _your_ kids on that?”

It’s not exactly an insult. Telepaths aren’t usually sent in on long-term, high-stress jobs like this, out in the field with no touchstones for stability. They mostly consult, or get called in for emergencies that last for a few tense hours before they can walk away and decompress.

“Yeah,” Gerard answers finally, blinking his eyes as the case files on his desk waver back into focus. “They’ve been trying to get someone inside close enough to bust him for months, without success. They don’t think anyone else can do it.”

Frank’s curled up in the chair, chin on his knee and looking thoughtful. “Which one are you sending?” he asks. “Smith’s the most level-headed, but Ross has got nerves of steel, and balls to match. Though they’re going to scream bloody murder when you try split them up, you know.”

Gerard does know. Thankfully for his headache, it won’t come to that. “I’m putting in Urie.”

It’s not often that he shocks Frank. “ _Urie?_ You’ve got to be kidding me. He won’t last a day. He won’t even make it in, they’ll see right through him, the kid can’t lie to save his life.”

Gerard is inclined to agree, but he’s also seen Brendon pull his shit together after two rough situations now, and he knows there’s more going on in Brendon’s spazz-monkey brain than the average bystander might think.

“He can make mass-murderers smile and think about phoning their grandmothers,” Gerard points out. “They’ll never suspect him, he’s like a high school kid with ADD.”

Frank opens his mouth to retort but end up chewing his lip instead, thinking. “Point,” he says finally. Then, “You’ve been thinking about this for a while now, haven’t you? That’s why he’s still working solo.”

“He’s not,” Gerard answers immediately. “He’s been doing really well with Ross and Smith, I didn’t want to break them up.”

Frank waits for a beat before saying anything else. “You think he can handle it?” he asks at last.

Gerard can feel the headache coming on again. He really doesn’t want to answer that question, because he’s been asking himself the same thing for weeks. “He won’t be strictly undercover,” Gerard says instead. “He’ll be in and out, he can check in with Walker every time.” And isn’t this a fabulous time for them to bring in a new shrink, too. Damn Katie for getting promoted and pregnant all at the same time.

“You’re taking a big chance,” Frank says, but his tone isn’t judgmental, just concerned.

“I know,” Gerard replies. And he does.

  


* * *

  
In the evenings, Ryan likes to lie on the worn carpet in his apartment, on his back, arms and legs stretched out, and let his mind roam.

He doesn’t read minds; that’s an invasion of privacy, an abuse of what he does and is, and he would never go in without express consent or in a case of dire emergency with no other option. But he does pick up stray thoughts, wisps of consciousness drifting out into the forgotten, and they pull at his unfocused mind like splotches of bright colour across his vision, full of texture and taste and emotion.

It’s almost a meditation, centering himself and reaching out, across the distance as far as he can reach. He knows what all of his neighbors’ thoughts feel like now, the familiar touch of their minds against his as he unravels, unwinds.

He can’t reach far enough to touch Spencer, but he doesn’t need to. He knows what Spencer feels like, inside and out, all the way to both of their cores; and this isn’t that kind of union anyway, this is something else. Everything on the surface, the vibrant dancing thoughts of a hundred people full of clamour and noise, love and sex and hurt and anger, all blending together into one.

He writes about it afterwards, and thinks that even Brendon might consider this pretentious, if he knew. Ryan doesn’t tell anyone, doesn’t show anyone but Spencer, the lines in his notebooks full of impressions and thoughts and his own possible beliefs.

It’s the human experience, pared down to a few words and blurred by his own interpretation, but it’s still something. Spencer points things out sometimes, an insight or a fragment that Ryan hasn’t been able to capture properly, or sometimes he says _yes, I see,_ and Ryan writes even more after he’s gone, enlightened by the feel of his own thoughts from someone else’s viewpoint.

He doesn’t do it because it’s therapeutic, or because he wants to understand all of humanity, or any psychoanalysis shit like that.

He just likes to reach out and know there’s something else there.

  


* * *

  
They all have a standing appointment with the department psychiatrist once a week. The other departments only have to check-in every couple of months, or after they’ve gone through something particularly stressful, but it’s different for them. Telepaths are more unbalanced, more likely to break. And what they experience during any given week is a lot more intense than what any of the others go through.

It’s only for half an hour, but it’s still Spencer’s least favourite part of the job, and he approaches his shrink meeting every week with a combination of resentment and dread. This week is even worse; he’s seen Jon around, and they’ve talked a little, but Spencer hasn’t had to sit in his office and bare his soul. He doesn’t like doing it, and he isn’t sure what to expect yet.

With Katie there were lines drawn; she asked questions, he gave answers, she didn’t dig around in his head and he didn’t try to force her out. He hates shrinks, he hates the whole idea of them, and he doesn’t know how well he’s going to interact with Jon Walker.

No one’s around when the clock finally betrays him and ticks over to noon; Ryan’s been sent out on a domestic violence call, and Brendon’s in some sort of private meeting with Gerard. Spencer gives Jon’s office a resentful look and heads over.

The door’s already propped; apparently Jon takes the ‘my door is always open’ policy very literally. Spencer spends a few seconds trying to decide whether to leave it open or shut it, and finally leaves it the way it is. He’s not planning on talking about anything too personal anyway.

“Hey,” Jon says cheerfully, head poking out from behind his desk. “Give me just a second; I lost some thumbtacks down here, and I don’t want to find them later with my toes.”

Spencer takes a seat and arranges himself in a very casual, relaxed, comfortable pose. Rule number one: Jon isn’t getting anything out of his body language that Spencer doesn’t feel like giving.

“So,” Jon says a minute later, thumbtacks safely in hand and spilled back into the Altoids container on his desk, “Do you have any questions for me?”

As an opener, it’s effective. Spencer has heard statements about himself meant to lead to discussion, comments about recent jobs, the ever-popular _what would you like to talk about?_ but this one’s left him a little thrown.

Not for long, though. “Should I?” he asks blandly.

Jon just shrugs, an easy half-smile on his face. “I don’t know, I just thought you might have questions. I know I’m always curious when I meet new people.”

It’s a chance to deflect attention from himself, so Spencer takes it. “You’re from Chicago?” he asks, remembering the personnel file they’d gotten from Gerard right after Jon’s official hire.

“Born and raised,” Jon answers. “I worked in the precinct there my first few years out of school, as part of their test case program I told you about.”

“No shit.” As far as their department goes, Chicago means one thing, one name pretty much everyone has heard of in their line of work. “Hey, does that mean you know…?” and then he cuts off, because he remembers now, although he hadn’t put it together at the time. _My friend Bill._

Jon’s grinning like he expected this question. “William Beckett? Yeah, he’s one of the guys they threw at us to see how we stood up to field work.”

Spencer’s a little impressed in spite of himself. Ryan scored extraordinarily high on the exams, a nine out of fifteen, and Spencer’s pretty sure Gerard’s around there too, but official word is that William’s a twelve. Spencer doesn’t know what he’d do with that much power, besides possibly go insane.

“So you passed.” It’s a flat statement, and really an obvious one, because Jon is clearly working here now, so he must have been a success story.

Jon cocks his head a little, and he’s smiling again, almost like he knows something. “You don’t like psychiatrists?” he asks.

Spencer shrugs, deliberately noncommittal. “You have my file,” he answers. He’s pretty sure that after this long, _hates shrinks_ is at the top of his profile.

“I haven’t opened it,” Jon answers.

Spencer stares.

“I like to form my own first impressions,” Jon says, and he’s tapping something on the desk that Spencer finally notices is a personnel file, with the sticky-tape label still sealing it shut. “It leaves me feeling less biased.”

Spencer has no idea what to say to that, but he doesn’t get a chance anyway. Jon grins and nods at the small clock on his desk. Spencer starts; usually by this point he’s counting the minutes.

“Time’s up,” Jon says cheerfully. “See you next week.”

  


* * *

  
“They just lost Bryar,” is how Frank begins, followed by, “For fuck’s sake, Gee, are you listening to me?”

“Yes,” Gerard answers automatically. He sighs, fingers laced behind his head, staring up at the ceiling like it has answers to offer him. “I know.”

“You’re still sending Urie in?” Frank’s pushing, just this edge of throwing a fit, and Gerard’s actually a little surprised. He doesn’t know why Frank is so worried about one of his kids, this time specifically.

“Next week. There’s a cocaine deal happening in Bolden, it’ll be the perfect opportunity for him to break in. He can work his way up from there.” It sounds so simple, when you lay it out like that. Start at the bottom, work up.

“Work his way up to _what?_ Being crucified by the mob boss himself? A fuck-lot of good that’ll do anyone.” Frank is pacing, a tiny dynamo of energy, frenetic and irate. He’s bouncing across Gerard’s mind in spikes of yellow and red, tumultuous and unstable. Gerard tightens his mental shields a little before the sparks start shooting in his direction.

“I’m talking to Walker before I send him in, and he’ll be back here practically every day,” Gerard tries to reason. “It’s not like with Bryar, we’ll be in contact, he’ll be fine.”

He wonders if Frank is losing it so that Gerard won’t have to, so that he _can’t,_ and that thought alone takes away some of the ache in his shoulders. “He’ll be fine,” Gerard repeats. “I promise.”

Frank stops pacing and hurls himself into the chair across from Gerard’s desk, the one Gerard mostly thinks of as his anyway. “I really fucking hate Toro,” he grumbles finally, and Gerard almost wants to laugh.

“You and me both,” he says seriously, and that’s when Frank finally seems to realize there’s something else going on.

“What is it?”

Gerard draws a little circle around the burn mark on the edge of his desk and doesn’t meet Frank’s eyes. “They’re sending Mikey in, too,” he says finally. He’s been avoiding saying it out loud for some reason, like that will actually change it, make it less real.

Frank sucks in a breath, and Gerard knows he gets it. “He’s smart,” Frank says, a beat too late and too quick. “He knows more going in, he’s been undercover before. It won’t be like Bryar.”

 _You can’t promise that,_ Gerard thinks, but instead he stands up and reaches for his winter coat. “Come on,” he says. “Let’s go get a drink.”

  


* * *

  
“Okay, we’re sending someone in,” booms the deep voice of the hostage negotiator through a megaphone, and Ryan wipes his palms on his jeans. “In exchange for one of the hostages. He is unarmed.”

“Link?” Ryan’s mind is already open, hovering in wait.

Brendon shakes his head, fastening the last strap on his vest and shrugging a law enforcement jacket over it. “Wait until I get in there, I don’t want to be distracted.”

“If they shoot you on sight we’ll be right back where we started,” Ryan points out acidly.

“Are you kidding? Bad guys love me.” Brendon tucks his hands into the pockets of the jacket and says to the officer-in-charge, “Ready.”

Ryan perches on a stool and waits, and everyone around him does the same. He watches Brendon go into the building on the monitor, arms raised with guns trained on him from every angle, and then closes his eyes and reaches out.

Brendon arcs across the empty space and meets him halfway.

“Five gunmen, three on the lower level, one in the vault, one upstairs,” Ryan relays instantly, and hears the scribbling of pens on paper as the officers take it all down. “They know about the snipers. They’re sending out a pregnant girl. There’s fiftee- sixteen other hostages, all alive, the guard is injured but he doesn’t know how bad it is.”

The steady stream of information coming from Brendon is soothing, gives him something to focus on. There’s a brief pause, and the link doesn’t break but Ryan feels Brendon shift focus, and he’s left with a high-energy blur.

“What about the van?” someone at his elbow asks, pushing for more. “Are they prepared to let everyone go if we give them the van?”

Ryan tries to dig, but Brendon slips away, shrugging him off. A second later his attention returns, and with it a stream of thoughts and impressions coming so fast Ryan can barely put them together to relay.

“They don’t trust the police, they don’t actually want the van, it’s a cover for something else. There’s something they haven’t told you, it’s got everybody on edge, they…no, they want the van, they just…” Ryan grits his teeth in frustration. “C’mon, Bren,” he mutters.

“What aren’t they telling us?”

Ryan stretches as far as he can, tempted to go through the link to Brendon and get into the lead bank robber’s mind himself, but he knows better than to overextend. “They’ve agreed to the van,” another voice puts in, distracting him from the chaotic jumble of Brendon’s thoughts. “They’re coming out in ten minutes.”

“Are they?” the officer asks Ryan, and he pushes the thought at Brendon, receives a thoughtful hum of uncertainty in return.

Then, “Yes. They’re leaving the hostages inside the building, they’re all coming out, going to meet a train but they’ll shoot if they’re followed too closely, and they’re taking…” He stops, frowning, trying to interpret that last burst of information. “They’re taking one hostage with them as guarantee. They’ll leave him at the station if nothing goes wrong, they don’t actually want to…” Ryan’s skin chills, understanding finally dawning through the press of unfamiliar thoughts. “Oh fuck, they’re taking Brendon.”

“Stay with him.” It’s an order, but a ridiculous one. As if Ryan would let go. Brendon’s distracted again, but not at all anxious, apparently comfortable and waiting on the floor of the bank with everyone else. Ryan sends a burst of concern and annoyance revolving around the fact that Brendon has once again gotten himself into one of these situations, and Brendon returns with a surge of affection that leaves Ryan blushing and off-balance.

“Fucker,” he mutters. Brendon’s laughter fills his mind, buoying him up in a soft, happy glow.

That’s when he feels the wall.

It’s at the back of Brendon’s mind, and if Ryan hadn’t been so absorbed into Brendon’s thoughts, he never would have felt it. It’s a shield, so subtle and slippery that when Ryan tries to get through it his mind slides off the surface like glass. He tries from several different angles, but each time there’s that annoying, invisible barrier, deflecting his thoughts completely.

Ryan’s trying not to be hurt and failing. It wouldn’t sting so much if Brendon weren’t so open with everything else, so free with his mind and his thoughts that this one walled-off secret feels like a slap in the face.

Brendon feels what he’s doing then, and wraps around him like a blanket, gentle and warm, pulling the shield further back into his mind and away. Ryan tries to follow and Brendon just shoves other thoughts at him, cheerful and unrepentant, images of his life and himself and Ryan and Spencer until Ryan is overwhelmed and has to pull back.

“They’re on the move,” someone reports, and Ryan speaks right over another reply.

“I’m going.” He fends off the expected protest calmly, without leaving any room for argument. “I have to stay close to keep in contact, and they still have Brendon.”

They make room for him in the follow-vehicle and he curls up in the back, listening to the hum of Brendon’s thoughts as they head to the train station.

He already knows Brendon is fine, of course, but it’s still a relief to see him standing by the lamp post waiting, and Ryan flings himself into Brendon’s arms and hangs on ferociously. “Stupid,” he mumbles, face smushed into Brendon’s neck, and Brendon hugs back just as fiercely.

“Can’t get rid of me that easily,” Brendon whispers, and Ryan almost forgets about the wall.

  


* * *

  
“Hospital. Terrorist cell, or part of it, they’ve got the building locked down. They say they want to negotiate for a patient. We think something’s going on beyond what they’ve told us, because frankly, it doesn’t make any sense. They’re not exactly talking, though.”

It’s the fastest brief he’s possibly ever been given, and Spencer is already reaching out. There are over three hundred people inside, most in a heightened state of panic, and he doesn’t have time to touch them all one-by-one. Ryan would be better at this.

As if he’s reading Spencer’s mind, Iero reappears at Spencer’s elbow. “Ross is on another call, he’ll be here as soon as he can. Urie is unavailable. Gerard’s already on his way, he should arrive in ten, fifteen minutes.”

Spencer has just enough time to be annoyed – what the fuck does _unavailable_ mean? – before something snags his attention. The ones standing guard are on the ground floor, he’s already skimmed over their minds and found nothing, just determination to remain steadfast and keep watch. But a few floors up, there’s a spike of adrenaline and a flicker like a candle going out, and Spencer’s brushed against death often enough by now to know what it feels like.

“Fifth floor,” he murmurs, and Iero is there instantly.

“Psych ward.”

And oh, he can feel it now. Minds like jagged edges, gaping wounds, one girl’s head filled with nothing but screaming. Despair and rage and the intense desire to kill, and among them one sane mind, cool and collected, moving through the rest like a blade of ice.

“Fourth floor.”

“Terminal.” Iero doesn’t touch him – thank God for his relationship with Gerard, he must know better – but he leans closer. “What’s going on, Smith?”

The shrill klaxon of the psych ward is slowing him down, dragging at his mind like quicksand, but he fights it off and follows the thread. “He’s moving down,” Spencer answers, isolating the mind he can feel moving with purpose, a narrowed focus that he still can’t read. “Everyone else is just waiting.”

“Waiting for what?”

He can appreciate Iero’s frustration, because he’s feeling the same thing. “I don’t know, I’m not close enough, all I know is that the one on the fourth floor is the one with a plan, all the rest are just…”

Waiting.

The elevator hits the ground floor and Spencer gets a flash, like lightning illuminating the dark, and he pulls back so fast it almost burns, reeling his mind back in and away from the building and slamming up every shield he has.

Spencer says, “Oh God.”

The bomb goes off.

There’s the sound of shrieking and yelling all around him, but drowning that out is the agonized, terrified wail of several hundred minds, all cutting off sharply as if someone had suddenly hit ‘mute’.

Some very dim part of him can hear Iero screaming orders, and then Gerard’s voice, “Get him out, get him out,” and someone tries to touch him. Spencer calmly sparks a shockwave into their brain, an automatic defense because he’s not physically able to protect himself right now, and sends them into a seizure somewhere at his feet.

“Don’t _touch_ him,” Gerard shouts, full of pain, and then there’s someone else, closer, saying in a low voice, “Spencer. Spencer, can you hear me? Spencer, I need you to focus on me.”

He can still hear screaming in his mind. There aren’t any survivors of the explosion itself, but there were people close enough to be badly burned, injured and afraid, out of their minds with pain. Too many. He can’t hear anything else but the screaming.

“Spencer.” Someone is being amazingly patient with him. He vaguely wants them to go away, but it’s too much effort to actually say that. “Spencer, focus on me. Read my mind.”

He doesn’t _want_ to, and the rush of anger snaps him out of it a little, just enough to pull his defenses into another spike, ready to lash out at whoever’s still there.

“Spencer,” Jon says, still calm in spite of the fact that Spencer can see an inferno that used to be a building over his shoulder and hear a shrieking cacophony of alarms crying out that something has gone very, very wrong. “Read my mind.”

He actually means to jab, a warning for Jon to leave him alone, but as soon as they come into contact he feels the screams muffle, like a blanket has been thrown over the rest of the world.

“Focus on me,” Jon murmurs, still there but not touching, safely out of contact. “Link with me, you can do it. Tune everyone else out. Just me.”

It’s like stepping into a quiet room. Jon’s mind is silent, no thoughts or images or sounds bombarding him, peaceful and still. The screaming grows even more distant, barely audible at the back of his mind.

Jon hasn’t made any move towards him, but Spencer takes a shaky step, and when he takes another Jon has his arms open, pulling Spencer close against his chest and enfolding him in calm and silence.

The screaming finally stops.

Spencer loses track of time, focused on nothing but the quiet, still emptiness of Jon’s presence surrounding him, and barely registers Iero’s voice when it finally returns.

“I’ve got Gerard, take Smith and go. Get him out of here.”

Jon shifts, and Spencer’s fingers tense, gripping the fabric of Jon’s shirt and hanging on. “Hey, it’s okay,” Jon murmurs, his hand rubbing slow circles on Spencer’s back, solid and warm. “I’ve got you. I promise. I’m not going anywhere.”

  


* * *

  
“Are you okay?”

Gerard doesn’t even look up; as hyperaware as he is right now, he’d felt Frank coming from all the way down the stairs. “I’m getting there,” he answers eventually.

He hears the wood creak softly as Frank sits on the edge of his desk, foregoing the chair. “Shouldn’t you be home?”

Gerard clears his throat and forces himself to look up. Frank’s eyes are soft and concerned, probably reading more in Gerard’s than he would like to share. “Spencer asked about the officer he took down,” he says instead of answering the question. It’s almost an answer; it’s the excuse he gave himself when he came here.

“He’ll be fine.” Frank’s tone isn’t dismissive, but he’s not letting Gerard dwell on this, either. “He’s in the hospital and stable. Your kids don’t shoot to kill.”

“Still. He’s pretty broken up about it.”

It’s something of an understatement; Spencer’s still in shock and not making a whole lot of sense yet. Thank God for Jon Walker.

“They know not to touch you,” Frank argues quietly. “They all know better. Faller just forgot himself. He was young, this was his first major disaster. It happens.”

“Nineteen,” Gerard murmurs, mostly to himself.

Frank swings his legs around the desk and puts his hand over Gerard’s. “No. Don’t do this, Gee.”

“He’s _nineteen,_ ” Gerard repeats, fingers curling in until his nails bite into the soft flesh of his palm.

Frank squeezes his hand, his grip just a little too tight. “So were you.”

Gerard closes his eyes and Frank leans in, the whisper of his breath and lips pressing soft against his forehead. “Go home, Gee.”

Gerard shakes his head, keeping his eyes closed tight so he doesn’t break down completely. After a minute, he feels the pressure around his wrist ease and Frank’s deceptively strong arm pulls him up out of his chair.

“What…?” He stumbles, but Frank just steers him to the battered couch in the corner of his office, pushing him down gently but firmly.

“Come here,” and Frank hauls him close, tucking Gerard’s head under his chin and holding on tight. Gerard lets out a breath that feels like a sob, and Frank’s embrace only gets tighter.

“You had a rough day too, you know,” Frank says into his hair, and Gerard exhales another one of those choked breaths, almost a laugh. He starts to say something but Frank’s arms tighten again, squeezing hard enough that he can’t breathe.

“Enough,” Frank orders, and he has his ‘I’m-still-the-boss-of-you’ voice on, cutting the words off before they leave Gerard’s throat. “Rest. Let it out. Get some sleep.”

Gerard swallows, and it takes him a minute before he’s sure he can speak without breaking down. “You’re staying?” he croaks finally, and winces at how desperate it sounds.

Frank sighs, and there’s a brush of something against his hair that might have been a kiss. “Yeah. I’m staying.”

“Thanks for getting me out,” Gerard whispers, and Frank chuckles softly, hand squeezing his arm.

“Don’t mention it.”

  


* * *

  
“Brendon’s hiding something from me,” Ryan announces. “Do you know what it is?”

Jon blinks at him, and slowly sits back in his chair, whatever ‘welcome to therapy, how are you today?’ greeting he’d been about to spout dying on his lips.

“How would I know?” Jon asks finally.

He has a point. Ryan taps the arm of the chair impatiently and thinks. “Is there something he’s hiding from you?” he asks. Because if there is, that’s different than if he’s only hiding it from Ryan.

Jon steeples his fingers on the desk and looks vaguely amused. “I don’t know,” he answers. “I’m not a telepath.”

Ryan narrows his eyes. “You’re a psychiatrist.”

The amused look on Jon’s face quirks crookedly into a smile. “Does that mean I know all there is to know about you?”

Ryan snorts. Jon’s hands open into the international sign of ‘I rest my case.’

“Why do you think he’s hiding something from you?” Jon asks. He has the mildly curious tone of the working psychiatrist now, and Ryan instinctively shies away from answering.

“I can feel it,” is all he says, and promptly changes the subject. “Thank you. For what you did for Spencer.”

Jon looks surprised. “It’s what I’m here for,” he replies.

Ryan starts to shake his head, but then changes his mind and shrugs. “Thank you anyway.”

“You’re welcome,” Jon says graciously, then pauses. “Would you like to talk about your working relationship with Brendon?”

No, Ryan definitely does not. “Do you know where he’s been lately?” he asks suddenly. Jon has to know, Jon’s in charge of listening to them talk about their jobs, and whatever Brendon’s job is lately that he’s not allowed to talk to them about, he must still be talking to Jon.

“I’m not allowed to talk about that with anyone other than Brendon,” Jon answers carefully, and Ryan’s annoyance doubles. “But if you want to talk about…”

“Why don’t you ever wear shoes?” Ryan interrupts.

Jon’s mouth is still open, mid-sentence; Ryan’s caught him off-guard. He follows the conversational lead smoothly, though, ever the professional. “I like my feet to feel free,” he answers. “Why do you always wear scarves?”

Ryan is a bit taken aback; clearly Jon thought this inquisition was going both ways. “Because I fucking like them,” he snaps, fingers tapping an accelerating staccato on the chair arm. The thing with Brendon is still bugging him. And he’s worried about Spencer.

“Do you like Spencer?” Ryan asks abruptly.

Jon seems to have finally given up on trying to take command of this conversation, but he still looks confused. “Spencer? Of course. He’s a nice guy. You all are.”

Ryan rolls his eyes at the stupidity of the populace in general. “Do you _like_ him?” he repeats, because there’s something going on there, and Spencer hasn’t said much more than that he thinks Jon’s a really good guy. He says it with a soft, ridiculous look on his face, though, which is why Ryan is suspicious.

“I…” Jon blinks, at a loss. Ryan gives him ten seconds and then forges on.

“Because if you do anything to hurt him, which you obviously have the power to do, being his shrink and all, I will hunt you down and kill you with the power of my mind. Are we clear?”

Jon doesn’t outwardly react to the threat; Ryan guesses he’s probably heard a lot of them. “What makes you think Spencer is interested in me?” Jon asks, and while there’s nothing in his voice besides professional inquiry, Ryan sees the way his finger twitches against the edge of a pen.

So it’s like that.

“Time’s up,” Ryan says, pushing himself out of the chair. “See you next week.”

  


* * *

  
Spencer walks into Jon’s office, closes the door behind him, and starts talking.

“About a month after I started working,” he begins, “I got sent out on a suspected domestic violence call.”

Jon’s look of surprise has faded almost immediately into an expression that says he’s listening, intently, and not judging anything Spencer is about to say. Spencer’s grateful for that, and also for the fact that Jon isn’t asking any questions, because it’s hard enough to say this without interruptions.

“They thought it was the father, but it wasn’t. It was the mother. She was…” Spencer shudders, remembering the feel of her, the hectic turmoil of an unbalanced mind. “Not well. She’d lost a child, a long illness, a lot of suffering and…” He shakes his head. “I didn’t know any of that. I just knew there was her, her husband, and three kids in the house.”

Jon doesn’t say anything. Spencer takes a deep breath. “I didn’t know what was going on, although I should have, I should have figured it out a lot sooner, but I felt one of the kids die and I thought it was the father, I was sure because he was drunk, and that’s all I knew, that she was crazy and he was drunk, that’s all I knew.”

He doesn’t need to explain about Ryan and drunk fathers, probably, but that’s not the point of this story anyway. “That’s what I told the cops. I told them he was killing the kids, and they went in. And while they were fighting with him…” Spencer swallows, remembering the grapple for control, the bewildered panic that had set in when the police burst into the house. “She killed the second one.”

It’s harder to talk now, he has to force the words past his lips. He hasn’t spoken to anyone about this in years, hasn’t had to. Whenever he thinks about it all he has to do is open his mind and Ryan is there, immediately, communicating without words. Part of him wishes Jon could do that as well, but it’s both easier and harder to get it out like this, in words that have some distance between them and his thoughts.

“I don’t…I don’t know why not the baby. I think maybe she thought she’d already killed him, but she’d been too gentle, or maybe…” He shakes his head again, focusing on the desk because it’s safer to look at than Jon’s eyes. “I don’t know. Like I said, she wasn’t…well. But the baby started waking up.”

It’s not only hard to speak now, it’s hard to inhale. Spencer feels like he’s going to pass out, and then Jon’s voice washes over him softly, for the first time since he entered the room. “Breathe.”

Spencer sucks in air and forces the last of it out. “The cops were all inside with the husband, and he had a gun, he was drunk, he didn’t know what was going on, I was on my own. I knew I couldn’t get to her in time, so I tried to…I tried to keep the baby quiet. Put him back to sleep. Anything to make her forget about him.”

He has a sudden vision of Ryan’s eyes, and that steadies him, helps him pull it together enough to finish. “The baby was a telepath. Or going to be. He felt me try to touch his mind, and he got scared, and he started crying.” He swallows, remembering the tiny, helpless flare of fear in his mind right before that life was snuffed out. “And she…” Breathe. Get it out. “She killed him. Because I screwed up.”

“Spencer,” Jon says quietly, but Spencer waves a hand and he stops talking, for which Spencer is profoundly grateful.

“I know it’s not technically my fault, I know I couldn’t have stopped her, I know everyone makes mistakes.” He’s heard it all, over and over again, from Gerard and from the department shrink who’d been here then, trying to help him get over it. Whatever that meant, exactly.

“Look, that’s not why I’m telling you.” He finally meets Jon’s eyes, and is relieved not to see any sympathy or pity there waiting to sting him. “I just wanted you to know. That’s what you would have read, if you’d opened my file. That’s what’s in there.”

It’s quiet for a minute, nothing but the sound of Spencer’s breathing, still harsh and loud in his ears. Then Jon says simply, “Thank you.”

Spencer looks away, his ears going hot. “You can read it,” he says. “I don’t mind now, if you do. I trust you. After…I mean. I trust you.”

When he looks back up again, Jon just shakes his head, serious, and puts his hand down flat over the thin stack of closed files on his desk. “I don’t need to.”

Spencer feels as if something that’s been hanging over him, weighing him down, has suddenly lifted and been borne away. And when Jon smiles at him, like he understands and it’s something secret between them, Spencer smiles back.

  


* * *

  
“Jon Walker,” Gerard says cheerfully. “How are my kids holding up?”

Jon takes a seat on the edge of the chair and folds his hands comfortably in his lap, as if contemplating whether there’s a simple answer to that question. “Ryan is exhausting,” he says finally. “I think Spencer’s finally starting to trust me. To be honest, Brendon could be hiding a mass murder spree and I’d never know, because I’m busy listening to the other ten thousand things he says.”

From where he’s curled up on the couch in the corner, Frank starts laughing.

Gerard nobly ignores him. “Ryan is generally not a problem,” he says. “He can handle a lot, and if there’s anything seriously wrong, you can bet Spencer will spot it before anyone else does.”

Jon smiles ruefully. “I’d gotten that, yeah. They’re close, aren’t they?”

“Like creepy twins,” Frank puts in from the corner.

“Don’t you have an office of your own somewhere?” Gerard asks fondly.

Jon grins. It’s a nice look on him; with all of the calls they’ve been getting lately, Gerard hadn’t yet seen Jon this relaxed. “At least Spencer is starting to talk; for a while there I felt like it was the two of them versus me. I’m not sure whether Ryan sees Spencer’s defection to the side of psychiatric evil as a betrayal or just an unfortunate event.”

“He’s probably fatalistic about it,” Gerard tells him sincerely. “And be grateful, the last two shrinks have been lucky to get more than two words out of either of them.”

“I’m not complaining,” Jon assures him. “I’m glad Spencer’s opened up, because therapy with Ryan still feels like a game of twenty questions that I have no hope of winning.”

“Welcome to my world,” Gerard says dryly. “I give him assignments still feeling that way.” He notices for the first time that Jon isn’t wearing any shoes. His toes curl comfortably into Gerard’s threadbare carpet.

“How’s Urie doing?” Frank pipes up, before Gerard gets the chance.

Jon takes a minute to consider and carefully phrase, which brings him up a notch in Gerard’s estimation. Jon might look young, but he’s good at what he does. “He’s under a lot of stress, but he’s handling it well,” Jon says tactfully. “I don’t think his current assignment will break him, if that’s what you mean.”

“Let’s hope so,” Frank mutters. Gerard throws him a look.

“It’s hard on him, having to conceal things from the others,” Jon continues. “You know how they are.”

Gerard does. He’s not sure whether the amount of tight-knit bonding his team has done is a blessing or a curse. “How do you think he’ll handle a slightly longer-term assignment in the field?” he asks, as casually as possible.

Jon pauses again to consider. “I don’t think you would push him into anything he couldn’t handle,” he says finally, and it’s a diplomatic answer, but the look in Jon’s eyes tells him it’s also an honest one. “If you have something for him, he’ll be ready.”

Gerard turns his pen over and over in his fingers, ignoring Frank’s eyes burning into him from across the room. “Thanks,” he says at last, when he’s come to a decision and hasn’t thought of any other answers he needs from Jon. “You’re doing great. I know we can be a handful sometimes.”

Frank snorts, but Jon just grins. “Hey, I came from Chicago. There’s nothing you can throw at me here that will be more overwhelming than that.”

Gerard laughs. “You’ve only been here for a month, and you have yet to see Ryan and Spencer in full allied fury,” he replies. “Somehow I think we can do better.”

Jon says, “Remind me someday to tell you about Pete Wentz.”

  


* * *

  
It’s past midnight, and Ryan should probably be in bed, but he’s not tired yet. He sends this thought to Spencer, curled up next to him on the couch watching a late-night movie, and gets a noncommittal hum in reply. Then he yawns, and Spencer gives him a look only exceeded in bitchery by the one Ryan immediately gives him in return.

All right, he’s tired. But he’s not ready to sleep yet. He turns his cell over in his hands, checking the display to make sure no new messages have appeared, even though the phone hasn’t left his hands for hours. Spencer glances over but doesn’t comment, passing him the bag of caramel corn.

Brendon hadn’t come into work that morning. Brendon hasn’t been coming in a lot of mornings lately, but Ryan’s questioning only leads to carefully neutral answers from Jon and bland, ‘he’s on an assignment’ dismissals from Gerard. He’s pretty sure Spencer’s tried with Jon as well, albeit with an equal lack of success. He’s still not sure what’s going on there.

 _Jon,_ he sends, with an image of Jon smiling and a little thread attached to see where Spencer’s thoughts go when he does it, but Spencer’s used to Ryan’s stealth tactics by now and bumps him away almost carelessly.

“I’m not a criminal,” Spencer says without looking away from the movie. “Stop interrogating me.”

“What’s going on with you and Jon?” Ryan asks, switching from mental to verbal to see if that brings any greater success. Spencer gives him a look.

“Nothing.” The look is ruined somewhat by the fact that the corners of Spencer’s lips twitch upwards right after he answers, a little secret smile that he turns back in the direction of the television.

Ryan is unimpressed. “I can’t believe you have a crush on your shrink,” he says. Although he knows Jon, too, so he sort of can. Spencer has excellent taste.

Spencer, ignoring his charitable thoughts, gives him another look which suggests Ryan has no room to be talking. Which is ridiculous, because Ryan doesn’t have a crush on his shrink or anyone else’s, so he has plenty of room.

He checks his phone display again and sighs when it’s still blank.

They watch eight or nine minutes of truly boring camera action, which is all that Ryan really gets out of the movie at this point because he hasn’t been paying any attention whatsoever to the plot, and then he gives in and flips open his phone.

Spencer glances over, their thoughts mingling enough that he doesn’t really have to ask, but he does anyway. “Brendon?”

Ryan nods shortly, listening yet again as Brendon’s phone switches automatically to voicemail. He flips the phone shut without leaving a message.

“Do you think,” Spencer asks after another few minutes of pretending to watch the movie, “that dating someone from work would cause problems?”

His tone is casual, but even if they hadn’t been mostly-linked Ryan would have caught the undercurrent of anxiety. He moves without thinking to quiet it, a stream of reassurance curling around the twitching nerves of Spencer’s thoughts.

“I think,” Ryan answers evenly, “that you deserve to be happy.”

Spencer shifts around to rest his head on Ryan’s shoulder and his legs over Ryan’s lap, thoughts muted now, quiet. Ryan’s glad he does, even though he never initiates physical contact himself, and he feels a ripple of amusement like laughter coming from Spencer at how obviously pleased Ryan is with the new arrangement.

His phone still isn’t ringing. After a while he sets it in his lap, unwilling to relinquish it entirely, and takes Spencer’s hand instead.

“You deserve to be happy too,” Spencer says after a while. Ryan just squeezes his hand.

  


* * *

  
Spencer is something of a Christmas fanatic. Ryan has known this for years, and knows better than to make a fuss when the jingle bells and fuzzy garlands start coming out of the closet and migrating to the office. He even helps Spencer carry the boxes.

“What’s going on?” Jon asks as they parade past, arms full of holiday decorations.

Brendon trots along behind them, carrying the box with the fake tree and wearing Rudolph antlers. “Christmas party!” he calls cheerfully, jumping up and down so the string of bells clipped to his belt loop jangle.

Jon comes all the way out of his office, watching in bemusement as they dump the boxes in the empty spot where Brendon’s desk used to be, back before he decided it was too far away. “Christmas isn’t for another three weeks,” he points out.

“Yes,” Spencer agrees. “But when the actual holiday arrives we’ll be busy saving depressed drunks and handling angry ex-husbands, so we’ve made it a tradition to celebrate early.”

“Oh,” Jon says, like he hadn’t thought about it that way before. Spencer hadn’t either, but last year Gerard had brought in candy canes for everyone two weeks early and warned, ‘it’s now or never,’ and there is no way Spencer is missing Christmas.

The next day Jon shows up with a thermos full of peppermint hot chocolate, wearing a Santa hat. Spencer might, possibly, have a slight crush.

Brendon is in and out more than ever, usually looking tired, but he throws himself into the holiday spirit with typical enthusiasm, helping Spencer set up the tree (with Ryan watching in horror from a safe distance) and stringing tinsel over everything in sight.

He’s gotten closer to Jon recently as well, and while Spencer thinks he should probably be jealous of Brendon sitting on Jon’s shoulders to hang hand-cut paper snowflakes from the ceiling, he’s actually just happy. Jon catches him looking, both hands wrapped around Brendon’s thighs to keep him balanced, and winks.

Spencer blames his blush on the heat.

Frank shows up during day two of the pre-Christmas party festivities, and throws himself into the melee with exuberance to match Spencer and Brendon’s. Frank is also something of a Christmas fanatic. At the very least, he’s something of a Gerard fanatic, and seeing Gerard drift out onto the balcony to watch the rest of them create holiday havoc seems to be enough of a reason for him.

“Are you really hanging mistletoe?” Gerard calls down. “There are only five of us in this entire department, and we have to share Jon Walker.”

“Be careful who you run into walking through this door, then,” Frank calls back, cheerfully unrepentant, and Brendon passes him some tinsel for added mistletoe glitter.

Ryan groans, and that’s all the warning Spencer has before the tiny stereo they’ve borrowed from Jon’s office starts playing Brendon’s favourite compilation of Christmas carols.

“What?” Brendon protests, and Ryan just throws his hands up, but he doesn’t escape fast enough to keep Brendon from throwing his arms around Ryan’s waist and crooning ‘Silver Bells’ into his ear.

“Gerard, we’re having a party down here,” Frank yells when the decorating is more or less finished. “Get your ass out of that office and bring us some goddamned punch!”

Gerard appears in the door to his office again, looking amused. “You could at least pretend to respect me in front of my department,” he comments, and Frank grins.

“Bring us some goddamned punch, please?”

There’s a clang-clash of bells as Brendon shimmies, and then he and Jon are performing the campiest duet version of ‘Baby It’s Cold Outside’ that Spencer has ever witnessed by two completely sober men.

Brendon has a gleam in his eyes that Ryan should really know to watch for by now, and Spencer thinks that maybe he does, but he allows Brendon to corner him anyway, squawking protests while Brendon drags him out into the middle of the room for a dance.

Brendon actually tries to _dip_ Ryan, and Ryan only weighs about eighty pounds but Brendon doesn’t weigh much more, so the two of them go down in a heap on top of the pile of rejected wreaths littering the office floor.

Spencer laughs so hard he nearly falls over, and when he staggers there’s a hand on his elbow, a warm body he collides with immediately when he tries to turn around.

“Careful,” Jon teases, eyes glittering with mirth, and Spencer’s just taken a breath to say something in reply when Jon says softly, “Look up.”

Spencer looks up. He has enough time to think, _oh, mistletoe,_ but not enough time to formulate any sort of plan besides blushing furiously, and before he can look down again Jon’s lips brush whisper-soft across his cheek.

“Merry Christmas,” Jon says, and it is.

  


* * *

  
“Go hooooome, Gerard Way,” Frank’s voice filters in through the door to Gerard’s office, making him look up and blink a few times before smiling tiredly. “This is the Ghost of Christmas Not Spent at the Office, whoooooh.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever actually met that ghost,” Gerard says mildly, and Frank’s head pops around the edge of the door, Brendon’s reindeer antlers hanging askew on his head.

“What are you still doing here?” he asks, perching on Gerard’s desk and poking through his mug of candy canes to find one of the spicy cinnamon ones. Gerard pulls one from the box out of his drawer and hands it over, pretending not to feel any sort of flutter in his chest when Frank smiles.

“I’m about to head out. Walk me to my car?” Gerard bats his lashes and Frank laughs, hopping up and bowing like a true gentleman. Christmas has taken the edge off of their relationship, made it easier to keep in good spirits and move past the awkwardness. Sometimes, like now, it almost feels like they’re still together.

His cell beeps as he’s walking out the door, three times for an official call. Gerard reads the message and swears under his breath, hesitating.

“Who’s on call?” Frank asks, correctly interpreting Gerard’s reaction.

“Spencer. Then Ryan. But they’ve been working for thirty hours straight, all of them, they deserve some sleep.”

Frank looks like he wants to point out that Gerard has, as well, but it’s different and they both know it. Gerard is working as hard as the rest of them, yes, but he’s no longer getting the brunt of other people’s emotions out in the field. Spencer and Ryan had both been sleepwalking when they’d left for the last call, and Brendon had barely been upright.

“You’re going to take it,” Frank says, reading his mind again. Sometimes Gerard suspects he’s really a telepath, just one with a very narrow focus.

“They need a break. The rush goes straight into New Year’s, I need them fresh tomorrow.” Or as fresh as they could be on five hours of sleep. Gerard sincerely hopes they’re all making the most of it.

“Mikey’s still undercover with the syndicate, isn’t he?” Frank asks quietly, and Gerard nods. They’ve never spent Christmas apart, and he’s not looking forward to returning home to an empty apartment.

“I’m going to take this call,” Gerard says, shrugging on his coat. “And then, barring any unforeseen disasters, I’ll go home and get some sleep. Promise.” He pauses, smiling at Frank and reaching out without thinking to straighten the crooked antlers. “You should, too.”

Frank watches him with a look he isn’t sure how to interpret. He could cheat, of course, but he’s never done that with Frank, and he’s not about to start doing it now.

“How would you like some company?” Frank asks finally. “It’s almost dawn, we could even get some breakfast afterwards, if you wanted. Celebrate Christmas morning.”

Gerard blinks slowly, and then winds his scarf around his neck and smiles. “I’d like that,” he says honestly. “Breakfast would be nice.”

Frank buttons his coat and pulls out his car keys, jingling them like sleigh bells. “Then off we go.”

  


* * *

  
Ryan hates interrogations. Reading anyone’s mind uninvited feels like an invasion, but with suspects it always feels even worse, knowing it’s against their will and the only thing giving him the right is a signed warrant. He’s legally permitted, required actually, to perform the interrogation.

It still feels like rape.

He’s read the file and done the briefing, so he knows what he’s after. The suspected-mobster looks up when Ryan arrives and sits at the table, placing his hands calmly flat on the table.

He knows what’s coming, but they both have to wait through the legal speech anyway, the recitation of rights and procedures and explanation of exactly what Ryan is about to do.

“Do you consent?” Iero finishes at last, and the man’s lip twists in an ugly sneer as he says, “Do I have a choice?”

Ryan doesn’t wait any longer.

Zeroes can’t feel him, although some of them think they can, shuffling their thoughts and memories as if they can hide what they don’t want him to see. Mostly it’s just annoying, people think most about what they’re trying _not_ to think about, and he sees a lot of unfiltered recreations of sexual acts and most of the guiltier kinks while he’s trying to sort through the rest of the rubbish to find what he’s actually looking for.

He finds it, a conversation about Toro that names two of his other henchmen specifically by name, and the location of the cop who went missing a month or so ago, his body stuffed into a car trunk and pushed into the junkyard, accompanied by a hefty bribe. And then he finds something he hadn’t been looking for.

Brendon.

Ryan pulls back, digging ruthlessly through the man’s mind until he’s sure he’s found every scrap of information possible, every flash of Brendon’s face and his voice and his stupid, brash laugh. Then he withdraws, writes everything he’s seen regarding Toro and Bryar down on the official statement provided, signs his name and walks out.

None of the officers can sense his current emotional state, and he keeps his face stonily blank, but a distant flicker of concern tells him that one person has picked up on it, and is on his way.

Spencer meets him outside before Ryan even realizes where his body is headed, and walks along in silence beside him until they reach the stone bench next to the civic statue. Spencer can read his mood a mile away, he knows something is wrong, but waits until he senses Ryan is calm enough to talk before he asks.

“What is it?”

Ryan curls his hands into fists and kneads them into his thighs. “I know where Brendon is.”

“What?” Spencer’s voice is surprised, and Ryan doesn’t blame him. They haven’t seen Brendon in over a week, and questioning Gerard has gotten them nowhere. He’s not at home, he’s not returning his calls, he doesn’t come in to work. He might as well have disappeared.

Except that Ryan now knows where he is.

“He’s working for the syndicate,” Ryan says, and his voice is low but he feels like spitting and throwing things, his whole body tense. “Undercover with the fucking mob.”

Spencer is silent for a long time. Then he asks quietly, “How do you know?”

“Interrogation,” Ryan replies shortly. He swallows. “I saw him. In the guy’s head.”

Spencer takes a deep breath in, and Ryan closes his eyes. Spencer’s voice is tight when he speaks. “Is he okay?”

Ryan doesn’t trust himself to answer that out loud yet, so he just nods.

“Fuck,” Spencer says, and pulls Ryan into a fierce hug, his breath hot against Ryan’s chilled neck. “Fuck.”

As far as Ryan is concerned, that about sums it up.

  


* * *

  
Spencer feels the brush of a mind against his and nearly turns, but the presence is familiar and there’s a warning that comes with it, keeping him stiffly at the counter of the coffee shop while an image appears in his head, the gateway to a familiar park and the grove of trees beyond.

He pays for his latte and spends a long time counting out change, and by the time he turns around Brendon is nowhere to be seen. He calls Ryan to say he’s running late, makes up a bullshit story with the underlying subtext of _I’ll tell you later, I promise._

Ryan says he’d better be there within half an hour and hangs up.

Brendon’s hanging out on a park bench waiting for him, coat sleeves hanging over his knuckles, swinging his feet like a lanky twelve-year-old, and not a telepathic police consultant working undercover for the fucking Las Vegas syndicate.

Spencer sits beside him and opens with, “Where the _fuck_ have you been?”

Brendon looks at him curiously. “I thought you already knew. Hey, is that for me?” He makes eyes, hands outstretched for Spencer’s coffee cup, and Spencer is too much of a pushover and too relieved to keep it from him.

“Take it.” He watches Brendon close his eyes and inhale, lashes blending in with the dark circles under his eyes. “Ryan’s worried sick.” Spencer is too, but he doesn’t say shit like that. Brendon’s goofy little smile says he knows anyway.

“They said I wasn’t allowed to talk about it, endangerment and the greater good, blah-de-blah-blah.” Brendon sips again, cradling the coffee cup close to his chest. “Mmm, this is good.”

“What, are they denying you coffee? Is it against syndicate policy or something?” Spencer is aware that he’s being a little more acid than Brendon really deserves, considering, but he’s been worried for weeks now and the relief at seeing Brendon alive and well is somehow coming out as pissed-off anger.

“No, I just miss this blend.” Brendon swings his feet again, and when he scoots closer, Spencer doesn’t move away. “I’ve been trying to stay away from places that people might recognize me.”

For the first time, Spencer realizes there’s another aura hanging over Brendon like a second skin, a mental scent that isn’t his own. He’s about to ask when Brendon’s mind brushes his again, tendrils extending like a flower craving sunlight, and when Spencer lets him in he knows immediately what it is.

Brendon twitches when he realizes what Spencer is seeing, almost pulling away until Spencer puts a hand on his knee to keep him there. “Who is it?” he asks, low-voiced and calm.

Brendon takes a huge gulp of coffee; Spencer can feel it scald the tip of his tongue. “A cop.” Brendon’s knee is jittering under his fingers, wired from nerves and not caffeine. “He’s the only one who knows about me. I didn’t mean to do it, I just. It just happened.”

Misery and loneliness roll off of Brendon in waves. Spencer wraps around him, feeling Brendon soak up the contact and slowly, gradually start to relax. There are a variety of thoughts and feelings regarding the cop whizzing around in Brendon’s head, and most of them flit by too fast for him to comprehend. There’s also a lot of Ryan, though, and Spencer already knows about those. He’s known for months.

Brendon follows his thoughts, the two of them meshed so completely that they’re basically completing each other’s mental sentences. “Don’t tell Ryan,” he begs softly. Spencer glances over, a question forming in his mind and leaking over to Brendon’s. “You can tell him about this, I mean. About seeing me. I’ve been afraid to come up to him like I did you, but you can tell. Just don’t tell him about…”

Spencer squeezes Brendon’s knee, and he falls silent, thoughts still darting and unfocused, but calmer now that Spencer’s holding onto him. “I just don’t think he’d approve,” Brendon says a moment later, and they both know it’s a lie, stained red and splashed with guilt in Brendon’s mind, but Spencer doesn’t call him on it.

“He misses you,” Spencer says quietly, all he has to offer. Brendon seems happy to take it, though, smiling and regaining some of the bubbling happiness Spencer is used to feeling when they link.

“I should get going.” Brendon drains the last of the coffee and waggles the cup in his hand, already distracted and jittery as he pulls away from Spencer, mentally and physically. “Thanks for this.”

“Bren.” He says it calmly, quietly, but Brendon goes completely still, eyes dark and trained on him. “Are you okay?”

He can only feel the surface layer of Brendon’s thoughts now, like ripples on a pond, but he believes it when Brendon nods and the aura around him brightens, just a fraction.

“Yeah,” he says, shoulders straightening and a little of the usual edge returning to his stance, a familiar smile creeping out just for a split second. “Yeah, I am.”

  


* * *

  
There’s a message from Frank on his phone, so Gerard goes straight from the office to the safehouse in Ida, climbing the rickety stairs to the top floor and rapping out the ‘all-clear’ code on the door.

Mikey opens it a second later, looking worn and frayed but very much alive, and Gerard hugs him and doesn’t let go for a long, long time. Finally he forces himself to back off a little, and Mikey just shrugs at him, the Mikey-equivalent of a tired smile, and they go inside.

“Do you want something to drink?” Mikey asks, cracking open the refrigerator and retrieving a beer for himself. Gerard shakes his head, sitting on the hideously-upholstered armchair when Mikey sprawls across the sofa. There are threads coming loose everywhere, he picks at one after taking a swig of his drink.

“How’s it going out there?” Gerard asks. He hates to talk business, especially when they’re only seeing each other for short bursts of time like this, when Mikey can get away for a debriefing and Gerard has enough time to meet him. It’s enough just to see him, but he also needs the reassurance that Mikey is okay, and he wants to hear it out loud.

“You know. The usual.” Mikey looks tired, limbs akimbo and beer bottle dangling limply from his hand. “It’s not getting any worse, at least.”

Gerard reaches out enough to feel the throb of a migraine behind Mikey’s closed eyes, and leans over to press his fingers against Mikey’s temples, correcting the balance and dulling the ache. Mikey doesn’t open his eyes, but he smiles faintly, just a little. “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.” Gerard brushes his hair back, catching the few strands straggling over Mikey’s forehead. “Anything else I can do?”

Mikey shakes his head, then opens his eyes and struggles upright. “Might as well get this over with. Go ahead, do your thing.”

Gerard hesitates, wanting to let Mikey relax for as long as possible without thinking about work. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah.” Mikey shrugs again, leaning back against the sofa. “I don’t mind. Better you than anyone else.”

Gerard says, “Okay,” and slips in as lightly as possible. Mikey makes it easy for him, used to both this aspect of the job and Gerard’s mental touch; the memories he needs are right on the surface, floating and playing out one-by-one for Gerard to relay later. Mikey’s all the way to Toro, which puts him in both a very good position and a very dangerous one, one that Gerard doesn’t like to think about with Ryan’s signed statement regarding officer Robert Bryar still sitting on his desk.

He sees snatches of people he mentally marks for later, syndicate members they have no information on or not enough, and then he gets to a cold night in a warehouse waiting for a shipment and sees more than he ever wanted to know about.

“You slept with one of my kids?” Gerard asks, more incredulous than anything else. He skips over the memory as soon as he realizes what it is, but the brief touch is enough to tell him how it ended.

Mikey grunts, struggling upright again. “Fuck. You weren’t supposed to see that.”

“I didn’t,” Gerard reassures immediately. He tries not to infringe on Mikey’s privacy any more than he has to, and there are some things about his little brother that both of them would prefer he never know. “Just the beginning.” He hesitates, but he’s worried about Brendon too, the same way he is Mikey. “How is he?”

He doesn’t mean for it to be a joke, but Mikey just stares at him disbelievingly until Gerard realizes what he’s said and claps a hand over his mouth, and before he can stammer anything out the two of them are laughing, gut-deep spasms that have them clinging to each other until it hurts.

“He’s good,” Mikey says finally, taking his glasses off to wipe his eyes. “Not your type, I think.”

“Fuck you.” Gerard gives him another hug, impulsive and tight, before collecting himself as well. “He’s holding up okay, though?”

Mikey shrugs, slumping over against the arm of the couch and rubbing the bridge of his nose. Gerard wonders whether the headache is coming back again. “I think it’s harder on him. He’s never done this before, and you guys are more used to…” He gestures vaguely to his forehead, with a movement like a whirlpool around his skull. “Being in each other’s heads all the time.”

Gerard nods, thinking of the mental hum he always feels in the morning when all three members of his department arrive and commune. He doesn’t think they know how rare that is, and he’s not about to tell them. Whatever works for the department and the three of them is more than enough for him.

“You take care of yourself,” Gerard says quietly. He doesn’t know how to express how worried he is about Mikey, and he’s not even sure that Mikey would appreciate it if he did, but the order is sincere. Gerard is not losing Mikey to Toro, not ever.

Mikey cracks an eye open and salutes Gerard with his beer. “Aye-aye, big brother.”

Mikey’s been undercover for long enough that he can’t drop off to sleep with Gerard there, and he’s obviously exhausted. Gerard waits around for long enough to chase the headache away one more time before kissing him on the forehead and leaving him in peace.

  


* * *

  
There’s a box of chocolates on Ryan’s desk. A box shaped like a big red heart, with a gauzy red bow on the top. He looks at it in bewilderment for the full five minutes it takes Spencer to arrive, and then looks up as if Spencer will somehow have an answer to this puzzle.

Spencer looks at the box, looks at Ryan, and says, “It’s Valentine’s Day.”

Ryan opens his mouth to say something catty, but Spencer has discovered another box on his own desk and is looking delighted. “Cool, I got some too!”

“From Jon?” Ryan asks sweetly. Spencer stops ripping the tinted plastic off of his box for long enough to give Ryan the finger. That accomplished, he pulls open the attached envelope and skims over the miniature card.

“No. From Brendon.”

Ryan jerks up instantly. “He’s _here?_ ”

“He was.” Spencer’s frowning, folding the card up again and examining the box in his hand. “Hey,” he says a few seconds later, grinning across at Ryan. “He bought you chocolates for Valentine’s Day.”

Ryan glowers, because he doesn’t blush. “He bought them for you too, asshole,” he points out, even though secretly he’s a little pleased.

Spencer directs a pointed look at the small square box in his hands, and then over at the heart-shaped and beribboned monstrosity sitting on Ryan’s desk. “Yeah,” he drawls. “This was totally for me.”

Jon comes in, wearing a shirt that must have started out white before being washed with something red, and holds out a bag of candy hearts. “Happy Valentine’s Day,” he says cheerfully, and then catches sight of the box in Spencer’s hand. He falters, but only for a second. “Oh, am I too late? It looks like someone got to you first.”

“Brendon,” Spencer says immediately, before Ryan can even open his mouth to answer. Spencer shoots a warning directly into Ryan’s mind, threatening grievous harm should Ryan say anything Spencer does not approve of in the presence of Jon and candy hearts.

Ryan smirks.

“Oh, that’s cool.” Jon is instantly upbeat again. He and Spencer are giving each other soft, goofy smiles, and if Ryan didn’t love Spencer so much he would be rolling his eyes right now.

He does, however, let Spencer know that directly, and the goofy smile vanishes suddenly in a hail of eyelash-fluttering and coughing. “I should…” Spencer says vaguely, waving a hand at his desk, and Jon bobs his head.

“Sure, of course. See you soon.” They both smile at each other again, and then Jon heads back to his office, munching on candy hearts, leaving Ryan looking significantly at Spencer.

“You can’t talk,” Spencer snaps, although he’s trying to stay quiet so it comes out more like a vehement whisper. “You have a giant fucking chocolate heart.”

“If you don’t ask him out by the end of the day,” Ryan threatens in his most sincere warning tone, “I will strangle you in your sleep.”

“Okay, okay.” Spencer sits back, absent-mindedly picking out a chocolate from his box, and then he suddenly grins. “Brendon got you chocolates for Valentine’s Day.”

Ryan rolls his eyes, but Spencer has used his magic powers for evil again and now he’s smiling, too. “Shut the fuck up,” he grumbles, trying to hide it behind the chocolate box. “God.”

  


* * *

  
Spencer pokes his head through the door to Jon’s office and makes off with his bag of candy hearts. “I just need these for a moment,” he calls over his shoulder, leaving Jon blinking adorably in his wake.

Three minutes later he’s gone through the bag and worked up the courage to go back in, armed with candy. When Jon looks up he grins, dropping the bag back on the desk and willing his palms not to sweat. There’s nothing worse than sweaty palms.

“I just needed to make sure you had the right one,” Spencer says, and slides ‘be my valentine’ across the desk.

Jon looks at the heart, and then back up at Spencer, lips curling upwards. “Won’t Brendon be jealous?” he asks casually.

Spencer laughs, reckless and giddy. “Brendon was asking Ryan,” he assures Jon easily. “He just knows that I’d kill him for not getting me any chocolate.”

“Wise man,” Jon answers solemnly, and Spencer is still a little breathless, looking at him. He can’t stop smiling.

“So do you accept? Or do I need to dig out a ‘kiss me’ so you get the hint?” He comes around the edge of the desk, unable to stand being so far apart, and Jon stands up, looking at him with the same warm brown eyes that Spencer hasn’t been able to get out of his head for weeks now.

“Spencer,” Jon says softly, and Spencer leans in and kisses him.

Jon hasn’t shaved in a day or two, and his stubble prickles against Spencer’s skin, setting his nerves on fire where Jon’s chin scrapes his cheek. Being this close to him is like going underwater, hearing ocean waves and nothing else, everything that isn’t the two of them suddenly very far off.

Jon parts his lips and Spencer tilts his head, sliding his tongue against the entrance to Jon’s mouth and letting his breath out in a sigh when Jon responds, his arm sliding around Spencer’s waist. He tastes like candy hearts and chocolate, warm and sweet.

For a few seconds, it’s heaven. Then Jon pulls away, reluctance in every centimeter of contact between their bodies, and says quietly, “Spencer.”

The tone of his voice is all wrong, and the silly half-smile on Spencer’s lips falls away as he opens his eyes and sees the way Jon is looking at him. It’s hard to breathe, let alone speak, but Spencer forces something out. “What is it?”

“I can’t.” There’s anguish hidden in Jon’s voice, but it’s nowhere near the ache that has suddenly opened up in Spencer. He feels like his heart has dropped into his stomach and left a hole in his chest. Everything has gone to static, and he hears Jon’s words as if they’re coming through a bad phone line, tinny and distant.

“You’re my patient. It’s not just that we work together, I’m your psychiatrist. I have a responsibility to you. I can’t betray that trust with this, Spencer, I can’t. It would be wrong.”

“Wrong.” That’s the word his brain chooses to echo, summing up everything Jon has just said, translating it into what he really _means,_ which is no.

No.

“Spencer.” Jon starts to take his hand, but Spencer jerks it away, and Jon doesn’t push. “I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t have led you on, I wasn’t thinking. I didn’t mean to.”

“You didn’t mean to.” Spencer laughs, and it comes out like shattered glass, jagged and painful. “Thanks. Well done. Great job of making me think you didn’t want this.”

“Spencer.” Jon reaches for him again, but it hurts, and Spencer isn’t sticking around to let Jon see that.

“I’m going to go.” He evades Jon’s hand but runs into the sharp corner of the desk, sending a jab of pain shooting through his leg. Jon doesn’t call him back. Spencer barely manages to keep from slamming the door on his way out, and it’s mostly because he hurts too much right now for dramatic gestures.

Ryan’s waiting by the stairs, expression blank. Spencer goes straight to him and holds on tight.

  


* * *

  
The last day in February, there’s trouble. Toro’s people have a run-in with local law enforcement, and there’s a cop down and three members of the syndicate dead. None of the bodies have ID, of course, which leaves Gerard pacing a hole in his carpet, willing Frank’s phone to ring.

He leaves a message on Mikey’s voicemail and chokes out, “Call me, you cunt,” before he hangs up. Mikey might not check his voicemail for days, he knows, but it’s the only thing he can do.

He wants to go down to the morgue, but Frank won’t let him. “You know it’s being watched, what are they going to think if they see you go in there to ID a body? It’s not worth the risk. They’ll call us as soon as they have names.”

“I’m a cop, the morgue will be crawling with cops,” Gerard argues.

“You’re not a cop, and how are you going to feel if you go down there and end up getting him killed?”

Gerard is on the verge of screaming something extremely childish like ‘you can’t tell me what to do!’ when Frank’s phone rings.

Frank immediately starts writing in his notepad, and Gerard is holding his breath. “Okay,” Frank says finally, and he looks up at Gerard, shakes his head quickly. Gerard’s legs wobble, and he falls back against the office door, relief washing every other thought out of his mind.

“Okay. Thanks.” The phone clicks shut and Frank says, “They got IDs on all of them, it’s not Mikey. Not Brendon, either.” He sounds weary, though, like he’s thinking the same thing Gerard is, that it could very well have been and now it’s only a matter of time before they do this all over again. And again.

“I can’t do this anymore,” Gerard says.

“Gee.” Frank comes back into his line of sight, worried and tired. “It’ll be fine. Go home, get some sleep.”

“No,” Gerard insists, pushing off the door and starting to pace again. “Fuck that, I want him home. I can’t do this.”

“Yes you can,” Frank argues firmly.

“No, I fucking…” is as far as Gerard gets before Frank has him against the wall and his tongue is in Gerard’s mouth.

It’s a surprise, and that’s rare; usually Gerard can feel Frank’s impulses before he acts, especially a surge like this one. But it only takes him a second to adjust before he’s kissing back just as fiercely, hands fisted in Frank’s hair and teeth scraping his lip.

He hates being pinned, so after a minute he pushes free and gets Frank shoved against the other wall, struggling all the way across the room and taking out the coat rack in the process. It hits the carpet with a muffled thud and Frank moans, scrabbling at Gerard until he basically crawls up his body and wraps his legs around Gerard’s hips.

The two of them are making enough noise that Gerard fervently hopes everyone else has gone home for the night. He gropes until he finds the chair, dislodges Frank for long enough to jam it under the door handle and then tackles him onto the couch.

Frank wriggles under him until they’re grinding, still devouring each other’s mouths, and Frank’s hands have pushed under Gerard’s shirt to rub maddeningly over his nipples. Gerard attacks his neck in response, finding every sensitive spot he’s ever known about, until Frank is thrashing and they’re both moaning and the whole thing is on its way to being over very quickly.

“Wait,” Gerard gasps, worming a hand between them. “I want your cock.”

Frank gets out, “Fuck,” before Gerard yanks his pants open and goes down on him.

It’s over fast, and not just because Gerard is cheating mercilessly by reading Frank’s responses and playing him like a harp string. He can’t keep himself from merging with Frank when they’re like this, he never has, and Frank’s mind blanks out white over his own when Gerard swallows and he comes.

He could take care of himself, but Frank is already pulling at him, still panting and dizzy. Gerard claims another kiss, this one some twisting combination of heated-dazed-urgent-lazy, and Frank manhandles him until he has enough leverage to stick a hand down his pants.

Gerard gasps, and Frank takes full advantage of his distraction by teasing, biting his lip and licking his cheek, whispering to him in filthy broken words Gerard isn’t even hearing because he’s too busy shaking. Frank might not be telepathic, but he knows Gerard’s body, his reactions, and he remembers what happens when he does that thing with his thumb and forefinger just _right._

Gerard sees stars when he comes, and then Frank is kissing him again, their limbs tangled together and leaden. “Haven’t had sex on this couch in a while,” Frank murmurs, and Gerard ignores him, busy licking his way into Frank’s mouth.

“Are you off-duty now?” Gerard asks, when the sweat starts cooling and reminding him of how uncomfortably sticky his pants are.

“Yeah.” Frank’s eyes are heavy-lidded, his hands stroking lazily down Gerard’s back.

Gerard lifts his head and says quietly, “Take me home.”

  


* * *

  
Brendon shows up as a cacophony of noise and light and motion in Ryan’s head, in the middle of the night when he ought to be sleeping but isn’t. He’s confused for a second, because it feels like Brendon but it doesn’t, off-balance and strange somehow, until the chaos clears a bit around the edges and he hears, _help._

He takes the stairs two at a time, out of his apartment building and down the street, and finds Brendon huddled next to a tree in the rain. Ryan throws his arms around Brendon and hugs him so tightly it probably hurts, but Brendon’s teeth chatter and he just says, “Gerard. Get me to Gerard.”

Ryan pulls out his phone and dials, one hand still on Brendon, because there’s no way he’s letting go. He tries to link, but Brendon’s mind is a swirling haze of confusion and bright colour, and Ryan pulls back within seconds, unable to keep in contact.

He doesn’t try the office or Gerard’s apartment, but goes straight for the emergency number, the one they all have programmed in just in case something happens while they’re on call and they can’t handle it alone. Gerard picks up on the second ring, probably just-woken but still sharp and alert. “Hello?”

“It’s Ryan, I’m with Brendon and he says he needs to get to you.” He doesn’t give any more explanation than that, because he’s not sure what he would say, exactly. Brendon starts shaking under his hand, the fabric of his sweatshirt damp but not enough to give him that kind of chill. Ryan wraps an arm around his back and pulls him closer.

Gerard’s instructions are quick and concise. “I’m texting you an address in the Ida district, I’ll meet you there. Has he been followed?”

Ryan opens his mind and can’t feel anyone paying them any sort of attention, but he could be missing something. Brendon’s wreaking havoc with his telepathy, a constant blare of dissonant sound and flashing light. “I don’t think so, but I don’t know.”

“Be as careful as you can, if his cover is still good they shouldn’t see you come to this house.” There are sounds in the background of the call, like hasty dressing, and the jangle of keys.

Brendon isn’t close enough to hear Gerard’s voice through the phone, but he must be picking up on Ryan’s thoughts, because he chants, “Blown. So blown,” through still-chattering teeth.

Ryan hesitates, knowing he needs to get Brendon in a car as soon as possible, but he feels like Gerard should probably know this now. “He’s on something. I don’t know what, but his head is a mess, I can’t link with him and I don’t think he can shield at all.”

Gerard pauses on the other end of the line, and then asks, “Do you need help with him? I can meet you first, but I’m on the other side of town, it’ll take more time.”

Brendon starts slowly sinking to the ground. Ryan hauls him back up, already dragging him towards the car, and says, “No, I’ll call Spencer.”

“I’ll meet you in ten minutes,” Gerard says, and Ryan hangs up. Brendon sways a little, and the noise-light-sound-noise grows dangerously louder before suddenly fading. Ryan’s phone beeps with a text, and he pushes Brendon into the car and clicks his seatbelt shut before flipping it open to read the address.

“Sorry,” Brendon says beside him. There’s a song playing in his head, rambling and sharp, loud enough that Ryan can’t block it from his mind without completely shutting Brendon out, which he refuses to do. He can still focus enough to drive, although his nerves are shot to hell so they fluctuate between crawling along at a snail’s pace and speeding fast enough to get him a ticket if he’s not careful.

Brendon starts singing, no words, just sound, and it’s not the song in his head, but something that jangles oddly in juxtaposition. Ryan reaches out to see if he can calm him down, but once again he has to grit his teeth and pull back. Brendon falls suddenly, suspiciously quiet, and Ryan looks over wildly to make sure he’s still conscious and alive.

“Don’t you fucking leave me,” Ryan orders, and puts his foot down on the gas.

  


* * *

  
“It’s Brendon,” is all Ryan gets out before Spencer is out of his bed and getting dressed, pulling on jeans and the first shirt he comes across. He’s out the door right as Ryan’s car pulls up, a dark blur behind the hazy curtain of rain.

Brendon looks like shit, and Ryan’s not doing well either, his hands clenched tight on the steering wheel. “Can you stay with him?” Ryan asks, as Spencer slides into the backseat and slams the door shut. “He’s fucked up, I can’t drive and pay attention to him at the same time.”

Spencer almost tells Ryan to pull over the car so he can drive, but Ryan’s already on the highway looking determined, so Spencer puts a hand on Brendon’s shoulder and squeezes. “Hey.”

He understands immediately what Ryan meant; Brendon’s head feels like electricity sparking off a live wire. For the first time in the past three-and-a-half weeks, Spencer wishes desperately for Jon. He isn’t sure whether it’s for Brendon, or for him, or for both of them, but he does.

Ryan jerks the car to a stop in front of the building they’re headed for and glares like he dares Spencer to say anything. Spencer is too busy unbuckling Brendon’s seatbelt and pulling him out of the car to complain about a crappy parking job.

“I’m not a complete invalid,” Brendon objects when Spencer ducks under his arm to support him, but he stumbles and nearly goes down a second later, so Spencer ignores him.

Gerard jerks the door open when Ryan bangs on it, and motions for them all to head upstairs. Brendon starts talking while they’re still moving, disjointed but coherent.

“Something happened to tip them off, they gave me a talky-truth-thingy, I don’t know what but there were an awful lot of questions, and I’m pretty sure I answered most of them, I just don’t know what I said.” Brendon trips over a stair and Ryan swears, but together they finally make it into the room upstairs and get Brendon onto the couch.

Gerard crouches in front of him, hands cradling Brendon’s head although Spencer is sure he feels the same way he and Ryan do, the instinctive urge to back away from the swirling chaos of Brendon’s mind. “Do they know about Mikey?” he asks, and there’s suddenly a collage of images splashing over Spencer’s brain, dark hair and pale skin and soft lips.

He sees Ryan jerk, but Brendon seems to pull himself together a little and shakes his head. “No. I don’t think so. They didn’t ask me.”

“Do they know about you?” Gerard asks, and Brendon starts laughing.

“Yes. Definitely yes.” More images, none of them fitting together this time, and Gerard tenses a little at the onslaught but doesn’t let go.

“Are you in any shape for one of us to get in your head?” Gerard asks.

Spencer wants to tell him flat-out that the answer is obviously no, but Brendon thinks about it and finally nods. “I think you’d better,” he says quietly. “I don’t remember what I said.”

“I’ll do it,” Ryan says, and there’s a panicked burst of jagged technicolour from Brendon that hits Spencer like a physical blow.

“Spencer. I want Spencer,” Brendon says, and Spencer feels the stab of hurt that comes from Ryan along with the sharp intake of breath, sliding right through his mind like a knife blade while he’s still reeling from Brendon.

“How about me?” Gerard suggests gently, and Brendon studies him for a long, serious moment before he nods. “Spencer, come help me with this. Brendon, focus on Spencer. Don’t worry about me, just focus on him.”

Spencer takes Brendon’s hands and holds his eyes, aware in the back of his mind that Ryan is still hovering, desperate to help. He’s pretty sure he knows why Brendon doesn’t want Ryan in his head right now, but one of his secrets has already been blown, and the other one Ryan has managed not to see for the better part of a year, even when it’s right in front of him.

He feels Gerard slip in, smooth and practiced, and Brendon twitches a little when he feels it, grip tightening on Spencer’s hands. Spencer keeps holding him, keeping as much of a link as he can open between them, and Brendon’s thoughts clash against his like an orchestra tuning while Gerard calmly sorts through his memories and puts every one back in place.

“Okay,” Gerard says finally, and Spencer lets go, sagging a little in relief when he’s no longer buffeted by Brendon’s mind. “I’m going to get an officer here just in case you were followed, and you’re staying put. Ryan, is there somewhere else you can go?”

Spencer opens his mouth to volunteer, but Ryan has moved to the couch and his hand tightens protectively over Brendon’s arm. “I’m staying here.”

“I’m staying too,” Spencer puts in before Gerard can ask, because even if Brendon doesn’t need him there, Ryan will.

Gerard’s expression shifts a little, like he’s trying not to smile. “I have some things I need to go set in motion,” he says, standing up. “The drugs should wear off in a few hours, but if anything goes wrong, you call me or you call 911, and get him to a hospital. Got it?”

Spencer and Ryan both nod, and Gerard gives them a last worried look before he goes. “Lock the door,” he orders before he shuts it, and Spencer gets up to slide the bolt home.

Ryan is curled around Brendon in a way that reminds Spencer of a wolf protecting her cub, determined and fierce. Spencer sits next to them and nudges him over gently. “We can’t fit three people on this couch,” Ryan objects, but Spencer doesn’t relent and it turns out they can.

Brendon has started shaking again, little tremors that he can’t keep in. Spencer tugs off the wet sweatshirt he’s wearing and gives Brendon his, wrapping him up before he and Ryan settle again with Brendon tucked firmly between them. Ryan links with him, and together it’s a little easier to touch Brendon’s restless mind, to project calm and control.

“How are you feeling?” Spencer asks, his leg hooked around Ryan’s and one hand rubbing circles against Brendon’s trembling back. Ryan pulls them both in tighter against his chest, Brendon’s head on his shoulder and Spencer’s other hand clasped tightly in his.

“Like I’m going crazy,” Brendon answers, grinning up at them before closing his eyes. “But it’s not really all that bad.”

  


* * *

  
Gerard would swear in a court of law that he hadn’t fallen asleep over his desk, but the first awareness he has of Frank is his hand gently touching the back of Gerard’s, enough to wake without startling him.

“Mmm.” Gerard forces his eyes open, feeling sleep-gummy and still tired. “You smell good.”

“I brought Chinese.” There’s laughter in Frank’s voice, and the crinkle of a plastic bag. Gerard peels himself off of the desk and begs with outstretched hands. “Hussy,” Frank accuses.

Gerard’s stomach is growling like an angry lion, so he doesn’t argue. “Brendon’s cover is completely blown,” he tells Frank as they break open the cartons of lo mein and sticky rice. “I put him in the Ida safehouse.”

“I saw that,” Frank comments, twirling noodles on the end of a chopstick. He eats Chinese with one chopstick and a plastic fork, in a way Gerard has never seen anyone else accomplish. It’s somehow both impressive and horrifying at the same time.

“Mikey’s still under,” Gerard says.

“We have Brendon to thank for that, from what I saw.”

It’s true; Brendon hadn’t given up any information on other undercover officers or past reports, chattering instead for a good hour about nothing in particular, including the best places to get ice cream in Las Vegas and a five minute speech on how much Spencer loved cappuccinos with whipped cream and a little bit of cinnamon.

“You know, for having no interrogation-resistance training whatsoever and being, by all accounts, hopped up like a bullfrog on truth drugs, he did pretty well,” Frank says. Gerard cuts his eyes sideways to see if Frank is being sincere. He agrees, of course, but he thinks it might have less to do with interrogation-resistance and more to do with the fact that that’s how Brendon’s brain actually _works._

“He got us a place and a date,” Gerard says quietly. He’s still not sure whether to breathe an immense sigh of relief over that one yet or to worry even more. When his questioners had started looking for information, they either hadn’t taken into account the fact that Brendon was a telepath or hadn’t realized his brain wasn’t scrambled enough to keep him from picking up every single thought in their heads from the moment they first came into the room.

Brendon’s shields had been down, and he’d been in close contact for over an hour with two high-ranking members of the syndicate who had information on a major deal going down that would involve Toro personally, as well as at least three other crime lords. It really was everything they’d been hoping for with this assignment, wrapped up in a perfect package.

“You think Toro’s going to change it,” Frank says.

Gerard throws a tired but genuine smile over at him, and steals a piece of his broccoli. “Stop reading my mind.”

Frank smiles a little. “You think Toro’s going to change it, because he’ll figure out who Brendon is and what he might know, and then you think he’s going to go through his ranks looking for other spies and find Mikey.”

Gerard rubs his temples. “Really,” he says honestly. “Stop.”

Frank pulls his hand down and squeezes it. “We’ve got a few days until this either goes down or it doesn’t. Even if it doesn’t, it’s not the end of the world.”

Gerard looks at Frank’s hand covering his, and can’t figure out whether he’s still hungry or not. He’s also thinking that he knows what every one of Frank’s tattoos tastes like, but he wouldn’t mind a refresher.

He looks up, and Frank’s expression goes from worried to wary. “Uh-oh. I know that look.”

Gerard turns his hand over to catch Frank’s wrist and pull. Frank slides into his lap at an awkward angle, but luckily manages to miss all of the take-out cartons along the way. “You don’t usually complain about seeing it,” Gerard points out. He’s already unknotting Frank’s tie.

“No, but are we really doing this?” Frank doesn’t object to Gerard’s hands sliding under his shirt, but he isn’t doing much in the way of reciprocation yet, either. “Last time I checked, we were still broken up.”

Gerard is of the opinion that this is no excuse to turn down mind-blowing sex, but he does at least feel a little guilty about it. He knows the only reason Frank went along with it last time was for him, and if he goes along this time it will be for him as well. “We still have a valid reason to be broken up,” he replies, hedging. His hands seem to have settled on Frank’s waist all on their own, waiting for permission.

“Right, because I’m not a telepath. Fuck.” This last is added as Gerard gives into temptation and curls his tongue around the lobe of Frank’s ear, sucking it gently into his mouth.

“It’s not a valid reason not to have sex,” Gerard says hopefully. He’s missed Frank, a lot, which shouldn’t be possible since Frank practically lives in his office most days, but it’s still true.

Frank’s hands slide up his arms, frame his face. Gerard has a sinking feeling even before Frank pulls him back and says seriously, “It’s a reason not to have sex with _you._ ”

That stings. Gerard sits back, although there’s not far he can go with Frank on his fucking lap, and tries to think of something hurtful to say in return.

“I just…you mean more to me than that. You did. You still do.” Frank is using his best pleading look. Gerard wishes he could fall for men with less scruples, who wouldn’t object when he tried to have strings-free sex with them in his office.

He exhales, more than a bit annoyed, mostly with himself. “It’s not going to change. The problem is always going to be there, so we either have sex or we don’t, but there’s no use talking about it.”

“The problem being that I’m never going to be enough for you, because I’m not an equal?”

Gerard has rarely heard Frank with so much bite in his voice. He blinks, both at the tone and the words. “No. Fuck no. I told you when we broke up, it’s not because of you. That. It’s because you deserve to have a relationship with someone who isn’t constantly reading your mind and invading your thoughts, usually without you even knowing about it.”

Frank is studying him like he’d missed something the first time they’d had this discussion. Gerard shifts a little and sort of wishes Frank would get off of his lap. It’s becoming awkward.

“There’s nothing I don’t want to share with you,” Frank says finally. “Is that seriously why you broke it off?”

Well, yes. “It’s not fair to you. Sharing or not, you should still have some privacy, and I always fuck it up and see things I don’t mean to, even when I’m not trying.” Frank has always been the exception to Gerard’s usual control. The closer they’d gotten, the more he started hearing, until being in Frank’s mind reading his thoughts was like drawing breath, only Frank never knew he was doing it.

“Gee, I sort of expected that as a consequence of dating a telepath,” Frank points out, with something like disbelief in his voice. “You told me flat out at the beginning that you couldn’t control it during sex, or when you were asleep, or half a dozen other times. I knew that. I know that.”

“But you don’t know _me._ ” They’re still not communicating, which is basically the point of this whole thing. The flow of information can only go one way. “I’m invading your thoughts and poking around in your head and you don’t have any way to do the same. It’s a permanently tipped scale. What happens when we fight, and I use ammunition you never gave me, or you start resenting the fact that I know every gift you plan to give me in advance?”

“I know you.” Frank shifts until he’s straddling Gerard’s hips, looking seriously into his eyes. “I know what you’re thinking, sometimes before you do, and I can still surprise you. If you’re not with me anymore because I’m not enough for you, then fine, that’s one thing. But if you broke up with me because you think _you’re_ not enough, then you’re a fucking idiot.”

It’s hard to argue the truth of any of those points. Particularly the one about Gerard being a fucking idiot. “What if I screw it up again?” he asks, sounding a lot smaller than he intended.

Frank kisses him, soft and light with the slightest hint of tongue. “I’ll probably forgive you,” he says. “But we can worry about that when we get there.”

Gerard kisses him again, sliding his hands up to cover more of the ink staining Frank’s torso. “Does this mean we’re back together?” he asks.

Frank grins and leans back, tipping himself out onto Gerard’s desk. “Convince me.”

  


* * *

  
Ryan wakes up from a sound sleep in the middle of the night, with one thought ringing clear in his head like the peal of a bell.

He reaches for the phone, and doesn’t even think before punching in the number. Gerard picks up sounding somewhat muzzy, which is fair because it’s somewhere around four in the morning.

“Brendon,” Ryan says. “Where is he?”

“At the safehouse,” Gerard says after a second, sounding much less bleary than he had when he’d answered. “Ryan?”

“Something’s wrong.” Ryan feels it with absolute certainty, even though there’s no way Brendon could have reached him from this distance, no way he could actually know.

“He’s contacted you?” There’s no doubt in Gerard’s voice at all. Ryan wonders if unquestioning faith and trust is a side-effect of working so long with other telepaths, or if it’s just an innate Gerard quality.

“Sort of.” Ryan is hedging, but he’s not letting this get written off as a nightmare or the result of too much worrying. “I just know.”

“ _Do not_ go to the safehouse,” Gerard orders, and the rumble of an engine starting in the background tells Ryan he’s already on the move. “Go to the office if you have to and I’ll meet you there. But do not come anywhere near that district, do you understand me? I’m on my way.”

“Okay,” Ryan says. He hangs up and sits perfectly still for a second, and then starts getting dressed. He calls Spencer to let him know what’s going on, even though he doesn’t really; and then, for reasons he doesn’t even understand, he calls Jon.

“I think Brendon might be in trouble,” he says when Jon asks him if everything’s all right, and Jon doesn’t even question it, he just says, “I’ll be right in.”

Ryan is going to make Jon get together with Spencer if it’s the last thing he does.

Spencer and Jon have both beaten him to the office, but there’s no sign of Brendon or Gerard. “Do you think…I mean, are you sure?” Spencer asks, with more than words, and Ryan can only answer with his conviction, but thankfully that’s when Brendon walks in.

“Holy fuck, you’re bleeding,” Spencer says, and Brendon waves him off, looking bruised and battered but amazingly cheerful about it, Gerard and Frank behind him like an honour guard.

“It’s okay, I was totally rescued, swept off the street in a hail of bullets and everything, it was awesome.”

Ryan’s eyes widen just as Gerard says, “There were no bullets,” and Frank laughs. “He was doing pretty well on his own, though, before we showed up.”

“I was not,” Brendon argues. “I was totally fucked. I mean, I took out the two guys, but it wasn’t like…I couldn’t do that thing you do, Spence, with the knocking them out and all, so I just, uh, confused them a lot and then hit them over the head with a frying pan.”

His voice is shaky, and Ryan realizes that he’s not actually all as together as he’d first appeared. Jon seems to know it, too, and moves in before Ryan can say anything, placing a gentle hand on Brendon’s arm. “Let’s go to my office for a little while, okay?” he suggests. “Just you and me. We can breathe together, it’s gonna be awesome.”

Brendon follows on legs that look too wobbly to hold him up, and Ryan turns his full undivided attention on Gerard, feeling Spencer do the same. “He knocked out two gangsters?” Spencer asks, caught somewhere between incredulous and impressed.

“Yeah, and he’s going to be paying for that any minute now,” Gerard answers, rubbing a hand over his face. Ryan understands completely; telepathic overextension is a fucking bitch. “We need to find him a place to stay so he can sleep it off.”

“He can stay with me,” Ryan suggests, but he knows they’ll shoot him down even before Gerard shakes his head. Brendon’s been there once, it’s not any safer for him than his own apartment. Spencer’s is probably not a whole lot better.

Frank is arguing for a motel room, and Gerard is objecting on the grounds that Brendon should be surrounded by the familiar when he wakes up, but he’s giving ground. Jon and Brendon appear just as he’s capitulating and Jon surprises them all by saying, “He can stay at my place, I’ve got a couch.”

Gerard hesitates, but Jon just continues making his case. “There’s plenty of room, Spencer and Ryan can crash too if they want. No one’s going to think of me, I’m not even technically in your department. It’s better than a hotel.”

“Okay,” Gerard says after another second, obviously watching the way Brendon’s fingers are digging into Jon’s arm. “But you call if anything happens, anything.”

Ryan has made his way over to Brendon’s side, and is standing as close as possible without physically being absorbed into his skin. Brendon smiles at him, although his skin is chalk-pale and his eyes look like bruises. “You heard me,” he says quietly. “Gerard told me.”

“You called,” Ryan says stupidly.

“Everyone into the car before Brendon passes out on his feet,” Jon orders, steering them towards the door. Spencer is obviously torn between staying with Brendon and being that close to Jon, but Ryan gives him a reassuring nudge and he gives in.

Ryan has every intention of following them, but Gerard’s voice stops him before he reaches the door. “Ryan, I need you.” He turns around and Gerard is looking at him, apologetic but firm. “We’ve got two syndicate members on their way in under police escort, and we need to know how they knew about the safehouse, and what else they know.” His voice softens, but it’s no less implacable. “I wouldn’t ask if there was any other way.”

“Spencer,” Ryan says immediately.

Gerard shakes his head. “You’re better.”

Ryan’s hand tightens involuntarily on Brendon’s arm. Gerard looks sympathetic, but he doesn’t back down. “I know, and I’m sorry, but I need you.” Ryan believes him. It doesn’t make him feel any better about it, though.

Spencer’s mind is suddenly linked with his, a flood of reassurance and calm. “I’ll be there,” Spencer promises. “Come over as soon as you’re done.”

Brendon sways a little, halfway to unconsciousness. It feels like the hardest thing Ryan has ever done to let go of his arm, but he does it.

Brendon reaches out and brushes his mind, softly, on his way out the door.

  


* * *

  
They get Brendon settled on the couch and he’s asleep even before Jon comes back with a blanket. Spencer stuffs his hands into his pockets, at a loss, wondering if he should try to catch some sleep on the floor or stay up and wait for Ryan. It could be hours, he knows. It probably will be.

Jon tucks the blanket in around Brendon and looks over at him. Spencer can’t read Jon’s mind, not at all, but he knows what that look means. He’s certain of it, and it gives him the courage to take two steps over and press his lips against Jon’s in a determined, earnest kiss.

“Spencer,” Jon says softly, but he hasn’t moved away yet, and Spencer isn’t going to let him.

“I need you,” he says, putting everything he has into the words. “More than I need a shrink, Jon. I need _you._ ”

Jon just looks at him for a moment, and then he takes Spencer’s hands and leads him to the bedroom.

Spencer isn’t letting either of them regret this, not now or later. He peels Jon’s shirt off and covers his chest with kisses, soft sparse hair tickling his chin, and undoes his own zipper and Jon’s without a shred of hesitation.

“Have you done this before?” Jon asks, hands moving down Spencer’s shoulder blades, and Spencer hasn’t, exactly, but this is also his first time without any input coming back at him from his partner’s mind, so he just laughs a little and says, “Not like this.”

Jon kneels between his legs and they just make out for a while, deep, heady kisses that leave Spencer arching up for more and not getting it, not until he inhales Jon’s breath and whispers against his lips, “Please, please.”

“Turn over,” Jon murmurs, and Spencer rolls and settles, heart racing, while Jon urges his hips back and tucks a pillow underneath. Jon’s mind behind him is a complete blank, and Spencer has never felt more exposed in his entire life.

“Breathe,” Jon whispers over his skin, and Spencer laughs, feeling Jon’s smile in the kiss he presses against the curve of Spencer’s ass.

He’s expecting fingers, but what he gets instead is Jon’s tongue, warm and wet and slippery, coaxing him open with soft, persuasive pressure. “Jon,” Spencer gasps, and Jon’s tongue wriggles in response, going deeper until Spencer is humping the pillow and panting.

There’s Jon’s tongue, and then a finger, and then Jon’s tongue _and_ a finger, which is quite honestly probably the best thing Spencer has ever felt. He pushes back into it, letting Jon open him wider, moaning softly when one finger turns into two with Jon’s tongue sliding slick and clever between.

“Please,” Spencer says again, hips working helplessly, and Jon says “All right,” breathing the words against wet skin, and gives Spencer one last lingering swipe of his tongue before easing him up and back.

“Tell me if it’s too much,” Jon whispers, and then he’s pushing inside so, so slowly and Spencer arches his spine and begs silently until he feels Jon’s weight against his back, solid and warm.

“Up,” Jon says, and Spencer shifts back with him, shaking a little at the slide of Jon’s cock inside him as they move, until Jon is kneeling and Spencer is in his lap, leaning back against his chest and struggling to breathe.

“Will you ride me?” Jon asks, and Spencer is already moving, tentative at first, growing bolder when sparks skitter down his spine and Jon’s breath hitches like a benediction. Spencer tips his head back onto Jon’s shoulder, gasping, and Jon’s hands roam over his chest, stroking his ribs and teasing his nipples.

“Jon, Jon,” Spencer begs, and he doesn’t even know what he’s asking for until Jon’s hands settle on his hips and lift him, moving him in counterpoint to Jon’s thrusts. _Yes,_ Spencer thinks sharply, perfectly, and barely remembers, several moments later, to say it out loud.

“Spencer,” Jon whispers into his ear, and one of his hands massages Spencer’s cock, not even properly stroking but it’s still enough, that and the feel of Jon moving inside him, and Spencer comes shaking all over, in helpless waves under Jon’s hands.

Jon pushes him down and Spencer melts, boneless, sighing when Jon bites the back of his neck, gently, and drives into him hard, a handful of times before he’s coming as well, and it feels so intimate Spencer doesn’t even mind that he can’t share in it.

“I quit therapy,” Spencer whispers when Jon pulls him close, cradles him against his chest. Jon laughs and strokes sweaty strands of hair back from Spencer’s forehead, presses a kiss there instead.

Jon says, “I need you more too.”

  


* * *

  
The unexpected presence of someone in his house wakes Gerard up in the early hours of the morning, but as soon as he reaches out he recognizes it, hears the thoughts projected towards him, _it’s me, it’s all right, it’s just me._

He leaves Frank curled up under the covers, snuffling a little in protest when Gerard slips away, pulls on a pair of pajamas and quietly closes the door to his bedroom. Mikey’s waiting for him in the hall, and Gerard goes straight to him and hugs him so fiercely he thinks he can hear bones creak.

“It’s over,” Mikey says when Gerard finally eases off a little. “They took down Toro and the other key members of the syndicate early this morning. The information you got was right, the cops were waiting for them. I was officially pulled out about an hour ago.”

“I’m never letting you work undercover again,” Gerard tells him sincerely. He still hasn’t relinquished his hold, but Mikey doesn’t complain, just rubs his back and laughs like he understands.

“I’ve missed you too.”

“I’m not kidding,” Gerard warns, finally letting go enough to move them into the kitchen, where he can turn on a light. “Do you want some coffee? A place to crash?”

“Nah, I’ll head back soon. I just wanted to make sure you knew, so I came straight here after they let me go.” Mikey swings one long leg over a kitchen chair, straddling the back. “Besides, it looks like you’ve got company.” He nods significantly in the direction of Gerard’s bedroom. “I take it this means you’re back together?”

“Ah.” Gerard scratches the back of his neck and feels faintly ridiculous, and also a little like a teenager. “Yeah. I think so.”

Mikey just smiles, small but familiar, a smile Gerard knows is heartfelt. “Good.” He leans back, preparing to stand. “I should leave you to it.”

Gerard recognizes the same reluctance in Mikey that he feels, though, and pushes him back down. “I’m serious about the coffee,” he says. “Stay a while. Frank’s sleeping anyway.”

“You could wake him up,” Mikey suggests, with a straight face that Gerard sees right through.

“I’m your brother, don’t be a pervert.” He takes the special Hawaiian blend that he saves for special occasions out of the freezer, and fills up the coffee pot. “Besides,” he says, looking back at Mikey with a crooked smile. “I’d rather spend some time with you.”

Mikey rests his chin on his elbows and considers. “I could make us some eggs,” he offers.

Gerard flips the switch on the coffeemaker and grins. “Deal.”

  


* * *

  
Ryan shows up at Brendon’s apartment the day after he finally moves back in, chest pounding and heart in his throat. “Look,” he says. “I know you have someone else, but I just really need…”

Brendon says, “I love you.”

Ryan gapes, and then forces himself to pull it back together again. “What?”

“I love you.” Brendon leans against the frame, a funny little smile playing around the corners of his mouth, like he wants to laugh but is maybe not sure whether he’s allowed. “I thought you knew.”

“I...” Ryan says, and Brendon tugs him in, shuts the door, and opens his mind.

Ryan links with him like they have a hundred times, a thousand, and the feeling of Brendon is all around him, like dozens of tiny effervescent bubbles exploding on his tongue. Brendon pulls him in and that wall, that fucking annoying as hell blank wall, goes down without a sound, and suddenly Ryan is enveloped in something so strong it takes his breath away.

“Bren,” he whispers. He doesn’t realize they’re kissing until he can’t breathe anymore, and then he’s gasping, pulling at Brendon’s clothes, and the two of them trip over every fucking thing in the apartment on their way to the bedroom, but it’s worth it to feel Brendon’s bare skin under his hands, the warm flex of his muscles.

“Want you,” Brendon mumbles against his lips, and Ryan wholeheartedly agrees with that sentiment, but he can’t decide what he wants first, so he just takes it all. Brendon’s thoughts glide against his, entangling and merging, and when Ryan draws his tongue down the flat of Brendon’s chest he can feel his own heart skip when Brendon gasps.

“You,” Ryan says, and Brendon says it back, or maybe again, and they’re tangled up and kissing again, hands stroking over skin and emotions bleeding into each other, until Ryan has no idea where he ends and Brendon begins.

“Inside,” Brendon says, or thinks, and Ryan is moving before he even fully understands, following Brendon’s impulses and reaching for the lube he now knows is in the drawer next to the bed, sliding it over his fingers without ever breaking away from Brendon’s lush mouth.

His lips feel swollen, and he almost raises his hand to them when they finally do stop to breathe, but Brendon just laughs, in his head and against his skin, and pulls him down again.

He feels it when he slides inside Brendon, feels both the tight, aching pressure around his cock and the stretch and burn of himself pushing inside. _This isn’t going to last long,_ Brendon thinks, or maybe Ryan does because Brendon suddenly laughs again, throwing back his head against the pillow, and it turns into a gasp when Ryan pulls out and pushes back inside.

He can feel everything, every nerve ending in both of their skins, the sizzle that sparks when his cock hits Brendon’s prostate and the duller throb when Brendon pulls him close to kiss him again, suckling his tongue until it turns slow and sweet.

 _I love you,_ Brendon whispers into his mind, a streak of white and a starburst of red. _I love you, I love you._

“I love you,” Ryan says silently against Brendon’s mouth, and feels the curve of his lips when he smiles.

“Fuck,” Brendon whispers, his entire body tensing, and it feels like drowning, Ryan goes under so fast, slip-sliding into climax with Brendon clinging to him inside and out, the two of them crashing together so hard Ryan can’t even breathe.

Brendon traces Ryan’s lips softly, and Ryan feels his fingertips tingle, the ghost of a touch. “I love you,” Ryan says, out loud into the nonexistent space between them, and Brendon echoes him with their lips already sliding together for another kiss.

  


* * *

  
Jon looks up when Spencer walks in, surprised. “Hey,” he says, not unhappily. “What’s up?”

Spencer closes the door behind him. “It’s Friday at noon,” he reminds Jon. “I have an appointment.”

“I thought we decided…” Jon trails off as Spencer bypasses the armchair completely, clearing a space on the desk and leaning back on his elbows, exercising every iota of come-hither eyes.

“You thought?” Spencer echoes, and pulls Jon on top of him for a kiss.

They’re just getting into some enthusiastic groping and necking when Spencer feels two very interested minds hovering around the edge of his own. Making a little noise of outraged annoyance, he pushes Jon off of him and marches to the door, ignoring Jon’s bewildered confusion.

“Out,” he orders, yanking open the office door to glare at his co-workers. “Get _out._ ”

Brendon is trying hard to look wide-eyed and innocent. Ryan is just smirking. As if he has any right, the bastard. Spencer caught the two of them making out on the stairs on his way in this morning.

“Assignment,” Gerard calls down from the balcony, Frank lounging in his doorway like he has absolutely no better place to be. “There’s been a murder in one of the casinos, they’ve got everyone in one place and want to see if they’ve gotten lucky enough to actually have the killer there, too. There’s over a hundred people in the building, so I want all three of you on it. I’ll call one of you off if anything else comes up.”

“Be good,” Frank chimes in from behind him, grinning.

Spencer turns around and sees that Jon has come up behind him, listening from the doorway. “Hey,” he says reluctantly. “I have to go save the world.”

“I heard.” Jon smiles and kisses him, lingering. “I’ll still be here when you get back.”

Spencer says, “I know.”

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [As Close As It Gets to Home [podfic]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/217904) by [diurnal_lee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/diurnal_lee/pseuds/diurnal_lee), [kronos999](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kronos999/pseuds/kronos999), [paraka](https://archiveofourown.org/users/paraka/pseuds/paraka)




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